A BC Hydro project that was expected to cost well over $100 million has now been cancelled.

Project manager Mark Alexander says the project – called the Peace to Kelly Lake Capacitors Project – would’ve been done on nearly 600 kilometres of transmission lines, from south of Hudson’s Hope to Kelly Lake, which is northwest of Kamloops.

He says it’s now been determined that the existing system has enough power capacity to last until 2031.

“The project was to increase the capacity of our transmission system between the Peace region and the Kelly Lake substation, near Clinton, B.C. And we were going to increase that capacity through the construction of new capacitor stations along the 500 (kilovolt) right-of-way.”

BC Hydro had first announced the project in the spring of 2018, and had expected the stations would be up and running by 2026.

Alexander says BC Hydro would’ve asked this year for the BC Utilities Commission’s approval, which he says is triggered when a project costs more than $100 million.

“It would’ve been a fairly significant investment. We were not building transmission lines, we were building stations along that 600 kilometres. Those stations were large stations, and they came with significant investments. We never did complete our full project feasibility estimates for the (BC Utilities) Commission.”

Instead, the corporation will now be making upgrades to four existing capacitor stations, located between Hudson’s Hope and McLeese Lake. Further details on that project are expected to come forward soon.