Doug Slater is vice president, Indigenous relations and regulatory affairs with FortisBC
KELOWNA – FortisBC Energy Inc. recently filed an application with its regulator, the British Columbia Utilities Commission (BCUC), for the Okanagan Capacity Mitigation Project (OCMP).
This project is FortisBC’s proposed short-term solution to an expected shortfall of gas in the Okanagan by the winter of 2026/27, driven by increasing energy demand in the region from continued population growth, and is in response to the BCUC decision in December 2023 regarding the approximately 30-kilometre Okanagan Capacity Upgrade Project.
The OCMP will help meet customers’ peak energy demands in the Okanagan starting in the winter of 2026/27 by developing a small-scale liquefied natural gas (LNG) storage and send-out facility in Kelowna. The facility will be utilized on the coldest days of the year to ensure sufficient energy can be provided to customers who rely on gas to heat their homes and businesses.
The Okanagan Capacity Mitigation Project will help ensure we can provide energy to existing and new customers in the region over the short-term while we continue forecasting and planning towards a longer-term solution in the years ahead,” said Doug Slater, vice president, Indigenous relations and regulatory affairs with FortisBC.
Located next to an existing natural gas station on industrial zoned land owned by FortisBC off Spall Road, north of Harvey Avenue (Highway 97), the proposed small-scale facility will contain six horizontal storage tanks with a total capacity of approximately 1,140 cubic metres of LNG upon completion—approximately 1.5 per cent of the volume capacity of both tanks combined at our Tilbury facility in Delta, B.C.
All LNG stored at the Kelowna facility will be produced at FortisBC’s Tilbury LNG facility in Delta, and loaded into tankers at the loading facility. Each fall, up to 30 LNG tanker truckloads will be transported gradually to fill six prefabricated 190 cubic metre tanks in preparation for the winter months. No LNG production will take place at the Kelowna facility and the tanks are expected to be empty for much of the year.
In the first winter of operation in 2026/27, one mobile tank and three portable LNG tankers will be filled and staged on site in anticipation of extreme cold weather events. If the project is approved, FortisBC plans to begin construction in 2026.
LNG stored at the Kelowna facility will only be vaporized and injected into our distribution system on the coldest day(s) of the year to meet peak energy demand in the Okanagan.
Source: FortisBC