Grand Chief pushing power plan for Ring of Fire – by Jeff Labine (Timmins Daily Press – November 21, 2014)

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – The Mushkegowuk Council, a large Northeastern Ontario Aboriginal organization, is positioning itself to become a major player in the Ring of Fire development by providing electrical energy to that whole project.

Lawrence Martin, the newly elected Grand Chief of the Mushkegowuk Council, told The Daily Press Friday that plans are being worked on to bring upwards of a thousand megawatts of energy from Quebec to service the Ring of Fire and to service Timmins if a smelter is needed here. He said this can all be done through the corporate jurisdiction of Five Nations Energy Inc., an Aboriginal energy distribution company.

Martin, who will be sworn in as the new grand chief on Tuesday, said the Mushkegowuk Council has been discussing major electrical infrastructure improvements for many months already.

Just a few years ago, Martin was known as the Mayor of Cochrane. He was elected to the post of grand chief that was left vacant by the death of well-known Grand Chief Stan Louttit, who died in June after a struggle with cancer.

Martin was elected in a recent council by-election over six other candidates, also well-known within the Mushkegowuk First Nations communities. They were Peter Wesley, Roderick Sutherland, Theresa Hall, Annie Metat, Peter Nakogee and Edward Nakogee.

In a discussion of his priorities for the Mushkegowuk Council, Martin said the organization has been working hard to expand economic opportunities.

“One of things we were working on was the infrastructure project, we call it. We’re trying to provide infrastructure into the Ring of Fire as a way for Mushkegowuk to become participants, and not just standing by and watching the action go by us,” he said.

The Ring of Fire refers to a massive deposit of chromite located in the McFauld’s Lake and Webequie area, about 600 kilometres north west of Timmins. Chromite is an important element in manufacturing stainless steel. The Ring of Fire area could become the largest chromite mining site in North America, a in a venture measured in the tens of billions of dollars.

Martin said the scope of the project is far too big and too lucrative to sit back and not get involved.

“So what we’re working on is looking at a hydro transmission line from Quebec, to just north of Cochrane, between Cochrane and Moosonee. And then, from there we would run it along the James Bay,” he said.

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