SaskPower enters stage two of $19.3 million southwest upgrade

For the second weekend in a row, SaskPower is planning an outage for southwest Saskatchewan.

This time around, the outage will be even bigger, affecting thousands more residents in the lower left corner of the province. 

Joel Cherry, a spokesperson for the crown corporation, warns about what to expect, and for how long it will last. 

"We're continuing our work to improve the power system in the Southwest once again," said Cherry. "To do that work safely, we need to shut the power off for a fairly large area of the southwest."

The lights will go out at 7 a.m. on Sunday, Mar. 17, and they won't come back on until 11 a.m.  

Communities like Maple Creek, Cypress Hills Inter-Provincial Park, Eastend, Gull Lake, Piapot, and Val Marie will be affected.

"A pretty large area again," noted Cherry. "Pretty similar to what we saw last week."

The work is being done to help replace an old transmission line. Approximately 19 kilometres are being ripped up, recycled, and replaced. The replacement, for material and labour, is costing the power company $19.3 million. That's nearly a million dollars per kilometre. 

"It's a substantial investment," Cherry granted. "But it's going to help to make sure that we have reliable power for a pretty large chunk of southwest Saskatchewan."

If anyone has questions about the work or any concerns about the outage, they can visit SaskPower.com/outages.