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ARIES (March 21 to April 19) You face the possibility of raising your relationship to another level. However, your partner might demand that you make promises you’re not sure you’re ready for.
email: office@keesheetmetal.ca www.keesheetmetal.ca KINDERSLEY, SASK.
LIBRA (September 23 to October 22) What appears to be an unfair situation might simply be the result of a misunderstanding. If you feel something is out of balance, correct it.
SCORPIO (October 23 to November 21) A stalled relationship won’t budge until you make the first move. Your partner offers a surprising explanation about what got it mired down in the first place.
TAURUS (April 20 to May 20) As changes continue, expect things to get a little more hectic at your workplace. An unexpected travel opportunity could open new career prospects.
Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan
Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan
Ken Francis, MLA Kindersley Constituency
Constituency Office
SAGITTARIUS (November 22 to December 21) A coworker shares some startling news, but before you can use it to your advantage, make sure it’s true. The weekend favors family matters.
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Phone: 306-463-4446 kfrancismla@gmail.com
GEMINI (May 21 to June 20) Confront the person who caused your hurt feelings and demand a full explanation for their actions. You’ll not only recover your self-esteem, but you’ll also gain the respect of others.
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Kindersley, SK S0L 1S0
Phone: 306-463-4446 kfrancismla@gmail.com
CANCER (June 21 to July 22) That personal problem in the workplace is compounded by someone’s biased interference. Stand your ground, and you’ll soon find allies gathering around you.
LEO (July 23 to August 22) You don’t accept disapproval easily. But instead of hiding out in your den to lick your wounded pride, turn the criticism into a valuable lesson for future use.
VIRGO (August 23 to September 22) That former friend you thought you’d cut out of your life is still affecting other relationships. Counter their lies with the truth. Your friends are ready to listen.
CAPRICORN (December 22 to January 19) Your usual conservative approach to family situations might not work at this time. Keep an open mind about developments, and you might be pleasantly surprised.
AQUARIUS (January 20 to February 18) Plans might have to be put on hold because of a family member’s problems. Don’t hesitate to get involved. Your help could make all the difference.
PISCES (February 19 to March 20) Relationships in the home and in the workplace need your careful attention during this period. Be careful not to allow misunderstandings to create problems.
BORN THIS WEEK: You have a keen, insightful intellect and enjoy debating your views with others who disagree with you. You also love to solve puzzles — the more challenging, the better.
© 2022 King Features Synd., Inc.
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“Small” enough to care, “Big” enough to supply
Twice last week, SaskEnergy set new daily natural gas usage records, and we can thank Alberta for most of our supply
On Wednesday wind power generation in Alberta collapsed yet again, but renewables are our salvation, right?
The evening of July 26, I did something that’s become routine for me – check on the status of Alberta’s power grid.
BY BRIAN ZINCHUK brian.zinchuk@pipelineonline.ca
I can do this because that province posts minute-by-minute data on the power generation from each and every facility connected to the grid. That includes 20 solar facilities totaling 977 megawatts nameplate capacity, 26 wind facilities totaling 2,269 megawatts, and three battery backup facilities totaling 50 megawatts.
ternal shortfall due to unforeseen outages or to displace internal generation during times where external market may provide short-term economic options.”
plant, very similar to Chinook, is under construction at Moose Jaw.
Not only was Saskatchewan setting electrical consumption records during the cold snap of last week of December, we also set two consecutive natural gas consumption records, too.
According to SaskEnergy in a Dec. 31 release, “Extreme cold weather across Saskatchewan this week resulted in record-breaking natural gas demand in the province. On December 28 and 29, natural gas consumption surpassed the previous daily record of 1.57 petajoules (PJ) which was set in February 2021.
“A new daily record of 1.62 PJ was set on December 28 and broken again on December 29 with total system delivery of 1.64 PJ. Delivery numbers for December 30 and 31 are not yet finalized, but are also expected to exceed 1.6 PJ.”
Nameplate capacity is the maximum capacity that facility can put out. When you build a coal, natural gas or nuclear plant, generally speaking, you get that nameplate capacity all the time, unless you purposely dial it down because you don’t need that much power. But for wind and solar, as seven months of study of the Alberta grid have shown, it’s an entirely different thing.
Wind and solar, our supposed renewable, green power salvation, are “intermittent power,” meaning they come and go. And that’s a problem. Because from my observations, they come and go a lot. And at times when our society needs power the most, they will occasionally disappear almost completely.
The natural gas records coincided with record power consumption. On Dec. 29, SaskPower set another record in power consumption for Saskatchewan. At 5:27 p.m. on Dec. 29, 2021, Saskatchewan homes and businesses reached 3,868 megawatts (MW) in power use, according to the Crown corporation. The previous record of 3,792 MW was reached four years ago to the day, on Dec. 29, 2017.
Saskatchewan’s power production has increasingly shifted from coal to natural gas as a fuel source. In December, Boundary Dam Unit 4, a coal-fired generating unit, was retired, reducing the Boundary Dam Power Station to 672 megawatts capacity. On the natural gas side, Saskatchewan has seen the construction of several new natural gas-fired power plants. They include the baseload North Battleford Power Station (289 megawatts), Yellowhead Power Station peaking plant (also at North Battleford, 135 megawatts), the baseload Chinook Power Station at Swift Current (353 megawatts) and peaking plant Spy Hill Power Station (89 megawatts). Another 353 megawatt baseload
Since the last week of December, I periodically check out the Alberta Electric System Operator website, which you can also do, here at this link http://ets.aeso.ca/ets_web/ip/Market/Reports/CSDReportServlet.
SaskPower won’t put out this information. In April I was told, “Saskatchewan’s electric utility is a vertically integrated system that has the responsibility for planning the system expansions to meet domestic demands, maintain system reliability at a stable, reasonable cost rather than the whim of the market. Due to this difference, displaying real-time market sensitive information would put Saskatchewan rate payers at a significant disadvantage when looking for opportunities to supply domestic load over the tie lines during periods of potential in-
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All of this added natural gas-fired power generation has, in turn, driven higher usage of natural gas during times of high electrical consumption.
The Crown noted that increased demand from SaskEnergy’s industrial customers, including natural gas use for power production, was the main driver of this week’s record-setting consumption.
Alberta’s grid data is updated minute-by-minute, showing not just how much every power plant is contributing to the grid, but each unit. There are only three coal units left in Alberta, a province with more coal underground that can be possibly imagined. At this moment Genesee Unit 1 is producing 394 megawatts out of 44, Unit 2 is 401 out of 400, and Unit 3 is 460 out of 466 megawatts. With coal, you literally get what you pay for – reliable, consistent baseload power.
SaskEnergy said it measures daily natural gas consumption for the 24-hour period from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. A PJ is a unit of measurement equivalent to one million gigajoules (GJ) of natural gas. An average Saskatchewan home consumes about 100 GJ of natural gas each year.
There are times when I see individual solar and wind facilities actually hitting their nameplate capacity. But those times are rare and fleeting. At this very minute, just before noon on July 27, three of Alberta’s 20 solar facilities are producing maximum power, and a handful more are just a megawatt or two shy. But other solar facilities at the exact same moment are producing two megawatts out of 15, 12 or 14. Apparently it’s cloud at Brooks at this moment.
“SaskEnergy’s natural gas system design can accommodate additional capacity to manage increased consumption even on peak days,” SaskEnergy president and CEO Ken From said in a release. “Throughout the year, SaskEnergy employees inspect, maintain and enhance the system to support safe and reliable natural gas delivery in all weather conditions. In addition, employees monitor the system 24 hours a day to ensure sufficient system capacity to meet customer demand across the province.”
I asked SaskPower some hard questions about this back in April. I was told SaskPower’s expectation is that the wind facilities will produce roughly 40 per cent of total capacity on a long-term basis. For solar, that number is 25 per cent. And to their credit, in announcing the new solar facility near Weyburn, the press release reflected that 25 per cent when talking about how many homes it could supply power to.
This province is now largely dependent on neighbouring Alberta to fulfill roughly two-thirds of our natural gas needs.
When natural gas prices took a tumble roughly 14 years ago, Saskatchewan’s domestic gas production fell off a cliff. Targeted gas drilling went essentially extinct, with next to no gas-specific wells being drilled in this province for most of the past decade. Our domestic gas production is now largely based on associated gas production that comes with oil production. As a result, Saskatchewan went from being a net gas exporter for the period of 1988 to 2009 to a net importer that year.
Getting back to last night, at around 10 p.m., being night, surprise surprise, there was no solar generation. But notably there was only 122 megawatts coming out of those 26 wind facilities – 5.4 per cent. I didn’t have time to do a story on it, but resolved to check it out again the next morning.
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“Small” enough to care, “Big” enough to supply
And at 10:16 a.m., just as people are getting up from their morning coffee breaks, I did. And wind, at the time, was contributing just 22 megawatts, out of 2,269. Less than one per cent.
This wasn’t at night, as people were going to bed. It was during the middle of the morning, when conceivably almost the entire population is at work, being productive. Industry is running. Welders are welding. Computers computing. Maybe even some electric cars are being charged at work. And wind was producing less than one per cent. That’s effectively nothing.
There is no way to describe this other than a complete and utter failure.
And this has happened time and time again. I’m losing track of how many times I’ve seen this, and written about it. But it’s a lot. I’ve listed a number of those stories at the bottom of this column.
What happens when we double or triple or quadruple our reliance on wind and solar? What happens when the whole fleet, as Alberta’s 26 wind farms, drops to a cumulative 1 per cent in the middle of the day? Will it be better when there’s 75 wind farms? So far, more is not proving better. So do we have rolling blackouts?
And if you think solar power is so much better, it’s not. A few weeks ago another random check of the Alberta grid showed that Alberta was getting just 13.5 per cent of its solar capacity – at noon! And that was during the week of the summer solstice, when not only should we be getting the most hours of solar energy in a day, but its highest intensity due to the angle of the sun in the sky.
Alberta is far further down this path to renewables than Saskatchewan. Their build out of the aforementioned 26 wind facilities, 20 solar facilities and three battery backups makes us pale in comparison. As of today, Saskatchewan has nine grid-scale wind facilities and two solar facilities connected, and they’re working on a 20 megawatt battery storage facility for Regina.
This is the path Saskatchewan is on. SaskPower is continually moving towards implementing more power generation from wind and solar.
Real impacts
So far, Saskatchewan and Alberta have been able to cope with the intermittency of solar and wind. But what happens when it becomes a much high fraction of our power generation?
My wife is a long-time ER registered nurse. Does my wife’s emergency room have to run on generators? If she’s doing a code blue on your father, or maybe even you, what happens if the power goes out? What if the generator fails to fire up?
Do we shut down our steel mill in Regina? Close your business’ doors? Do we just accept regressing to the power generation reliability of a third world country?
Time and again, when I go online just to check how things are going in Alberta’s power grid, and
this is what I find: Wind, or solar, has flatlined, and battery backups are contributing precisely zero.
And what happens when, in 12.5 years, the federal government has banned the sale of internal combustion engine light vehicles, and everyone is plugging in their electric vehicles?
Banging the same drum
Yes, I keep banging on this drum. Why? Because we cannot run a modern 21st century economy on a power supply that, in the middle of the day, can and does drop to less than one per cent output.
And the supposed salvation of battery backup? In seven months, I have yet to see Alberta draw one megawatt from its 50 megawatts of battery backup. I’m not saying it doesn’t happen. But every time I do a story on wind or solar flatlining, there’s nothing coming from the batteries. It’s a life preserver that never gets thrown out to the drowning grid.
Maybe the grid’s not drowning, yet. But Alberta is on track to shut down its last coal plants soon, and the feds are pushing Saskatchewan to do the same. And there’s no way in hell we will have nuclear in place in time to replace our remaining coal. So we either stretch out the life of our coal facilities, build out 1,389 megawatts of gas-fired power in 7.5 years, buy a similar amount from Manitoba, Montana or North Dakota, or sit in the dark. And that’s just to replace existing coal, not dramatically increase power production due to the impending electrification of the transportation fleet.
And while I keep banging this drum, ask yourself when was the last time you saw any of the other media asking about this, questioning this supposed green transition? You won’t see it, because the mainstream media has bought it hook, line and sinker.
I keep finding examples of the complete and utter failure of either wind or solar, or sometimes both, to provide power during our times of greatest need – the hottest and coldest days of the year. This pattern is not a fluke. It’s consistent. The people pushing these renewables either know this and choose not to talk about it, or they are willfully ignorant. Neither is acceptable. We need to keep the lights on. We cannot start to experience brownouts and blackouts like California. We can’t have hospitals running on generators because we choose to screw up the best thing we have going in modern society – reliable power generation. Lives will hang in the balance if we get this wrong, and our society is rapidly moving towards screwing this up.
Two hours later, at noon on July 27, Alberta’s wind had picked up to a whole 67 megawatts of 2,269. It was now 3 per cent of capacity! Just 11 of its 26 wind farms were producing zero megawatts at 12:10 p.m. Some might call that progress.
Brian Zinchuk is editor and owner of Pipeline Online. He can be reached at brian.zinchuk@pipelineonline.ca.
KINDERSLEY PACKERS
Alberts
Bahm
Thiessen
Kissick
Lee
Jordan Mackinnon
Caitlynn Alberts
Brad Murphy
Quenton Murphy
Chelsea Kissick
Make Pounded Pansy Pouches
down and stem side up. Cover it with a sheet of wax paper and hammer over the wax-paper-covered flower until its color has been absorbed into the fabric. Remove the wax paper and pansy to reveal the natural, colorful floral design.
Devin Charteris
Jon Shepherd
Dylan MacKinnon
Dustin Oikor
Wyatt Knorr
I don't know a young child who doesn't love a hammer. Watch when kids grab one tightly in both small hands, lift it high and pound. Thud! They see it do something. It might only be a nick on a board, or, if lucky, they'll hit a nail square on. Throughout the action, it's a thrilling feeling of control and an introduction to the adult world.
Hammers can be the perfect tool for kids to make imprints of fragile flowers, too. When they tap, tap, tap a wax-paper-covered flower on fabric, they magically see the bloom's natural colors and shapes appear right before their eyes.
No wonder families recently filled the benches at a craft booth at our local weekend farmer's market. Pounding natural designs of violet pansies onto fabric was the first step. Then the children learned to hand-sew pouches with simple stitches after the pounding. Even some preschoolers could sew handily with adult assistance.
Here's how:
3. It's time to sew the two fabric pieces together to form the neck pouch. Thread a large needle with a 30-inch length of embroidery floss. Stack the fabric pieces with the floral print on top and, beginning at the top right corner, sew the sides and bottom together with a running stitch. Guide your child's hands when needed. When complete, remove the needle and knot the end of the floss to the starting corner of the pouch.
Travis Turnbull
James Semilet
Dylan Beaudoin
Place the pouch around your child's neck and put a coin or some treasure inside.
From left to right
1. Cut two pieces of plain white cotton or muslin fabric 2 3/4 inch wide by 3 inches long with pinking shears.
2. Put one of the fabric pieces on a cutting board or a flat piece of wood. Carefully set a fresh pansy bloom in the middle of the fabric — front side
For more ideas about crafting with natural materials, visit www.heartfeltonline.com.
Fire Chief Vic Sittler, Shane Kruesel, Jarret Johnson, Deputy Chief Grant Sittler, Deputy Chief Grant Christison, Michael Bowden.
Missing:
Steven McMillan, Caleb MacDonald, Cory Turk, Dean Ellis, Devon Lovenuk, Jordan Halter, Kaid Hoffman, Patrick McGrath, Ryan Neumeier, Trent Nienaber, Travis Kennon
Find more family fun at www.donnaerickson.com. Write to Donna at Info@donnaerickson.com © 2022 Donna Erickson Distributed by King Features Synd.
Tyler Srigley, Ryan Webber
Back row (Left to Right)
Steven Meissner, Brenden Obrigewitch
Nick Anderson Brad Galbraith (Captain)
Keagan Bazylinski , Kirk Meyer Shane Bardick
A mother places her son's crafty pansy pouch around his neck.
Kid’s Korner
* On Aug. 4, 1753, George Washington, a young Virginia planter, becomes a Master Mason, the highest basic rank in Freemasonry. The ceremony was held at the Masonic Lodge No. 4 in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Washington was 21 years old and would soon command his first military operation. Freemasons trace the origins of masonry back to the erecting of King Solomon’s Temple in biblical times.
* On Aug. 6, 1911, Lucille Desiree Ball, one of America’s most famous redheads and beloved comic actresses, is born near Jamestown, New York. Ball starred with husband Ricky Ricardo on television’s “I Love Lucy” from 1951 to 1957.
dead. Two crewmen were, in fact, killed, but 11 survived, including Lt. John F. Kennedy, who would later become president.
* On Aug. 7, 1964, the United States Congress approves the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, giving President Lyndon B. Johnson nearly unlimited powers to oppose “communist aggression” in Southeast Asia. The Johnson administration began heavy bombing of North Vietnam in early 1965 and sent U.S. combat troops in March 1965.
* On Aug. 2, 1939, Wes Craven, the man responsible for terrorizing millions of moviegoers with his “Nightmare on Elm Street” series, is born. Craven began his directing career with 1972’s “The Last House on the Left,” a violent teen horror film.
* On Aug. 1, 1943, a Japanese destroyer rams an American PT (patrol torpedo) boat, No. 109, slicing it in two. The destruction is so massive, other American PT boats in the area assume the crew is
* On Aug. 3, 1977, “The Spy Who Loved Me,” starring Roger Moore as James Bond, is released in theaters. The film features one of the most memorable Bond vehicles of all time -- a sleek, powerful Lotus Esprit sports car that does double duty as a submarine.
* On Aug. 5, 2002, the rusty iron gun turret of the ironclad warship U.S.S. Monitor is raised from the floor of the Atlantic, where it had rested since it went down in a storm off North Carolina during the Civil War. She sank in December 1862, while being towed from Cape Hatteras.
HOLLYWOOD — I was 11, and Carol Burnett was 26 when we first met. I haunted a candy store next to the off-Broadway Phoenix Theater, where Carol was starring in “Once Upon a Mattress.” When she became a regular on “The Garry Moore Show,” I was her guest at tapings each week. Had it not been for Carol, you might not be reading this. “The Carol Burnett Show” became a classic CBS variety series, and she became a legend.
At 89, Carol’s in her third marriage to Hollywood Bowl Orchestra drummer Brian Miller, and they’re celebrating 21 years together come November. The “Carol Burnett Show” and “Mama’s Family” have been huge successes in syndication for years. She could easily rest on her laurels, but happily, she’s signed to be a regular in the 10-part Apple TV+ series “Mrs. American Pie,” produced by and starring Oscar-winner Laura Dern, who’s assembled a great cast: Kristen Wiig, Allison Janney, Ricky Martin and Josh Lucas. It’s about a woman trying to break into Palm Beach Society. Thanks, Carol, for pointing me in the right direction.
Obviously taking a cue from Lin-Manuel Miranda’s mega successful “Hamilton,” which depicted all of our forefathers diversely (the only non-person-of-color being King George III), a revival of the classic musical “1776” is now headed to Broadway, getting booked for the Ahmanson Theater in Los Angeles from April 5 to May 7, 2023. This production will feature a cast of female, trans and nonbinary performers. Since the show originally consisted of mostly 23 men and only 2 women — being about the Continental Congress’ creation of the Declaration of Independence — the question is, Are they rewriting history, or are they just taking many liberties?



Movie theaters may finally be getting their audiences back. It’s going to be a three-way fight between “Top Gun: Maverick,” which joined the billion-dollar film club after one month in release; “Jurassic World: Dominion,” which reached a billion-dollar gross in half the time; and “Elvis,” which swiveled out of the gate strongly and is nipping at their heels. Moviegoers were stunned by Tom Hanks’ portrayal of Col. Tom Parker, partly because they didn’t know Parker was a greedy, ruthless man who purposely held Elvis Presley back to make more money. Sept. 8 will bring Hanks as “Pinocchio’s” father, Geppetto, and on Dec. 25, he’ll be a grumpy retiree in “A Man Called Otto.” Tom Cruise turned 60 on July 3, and if “Elvis” eventually beats “Maverick” at the box office, does that mean Tom will be cruised out to pasture by an Elvis impersonator?
Carol Burnett
Sonja Flemming/CBS