Chris Huskilson of Emera Inc., Halifax, Nova Scotia. Photo: Erik Russell

Enclosed are remarks made by Emera, President and CEO, Chris Huskilson at the Grand Bahama Chamber of Commerce Luncheon on February 25th.

I’m pleased to be able to introduce our Company, Emera to you, and thank you for this warm welcome.  It has meant a lot for me, and others with Emera, to be greeted warmly to this business community.

And we are excited to be here. When people ask me why we invested in Grand Bahama Power I am delighted to give the answer.

We see great potential in Grand Bahama, it has great potential for, and to position itself with strength in the Carribean. We take pride in recognizing a good investment. And we are eager to help you, our customers, and this island realize that potential.

After all, we share a lot. We share a maritime background. And with that comes some fundamental values. An appreciation and respect for the power of the ocean and nature. An appreciation of tradition. And of course self-reliance  and self-sufficiency.

I could give you a lot of facts about Emera. But really, over time, I want to show you the kind of company we are. Emera began as Nova Scotia Power generating electricity and distributing power for about 1 million people in the province of Nova Scotia, Canada.

As you saw in the video some of our hydro facilities are more than a hundred years old… literally since the very birth of the industry.

We were one of the first utilities in Canada to install wind turbines to generate power for our customers.

We built the first pulverized coal plant in North America at the turn of the last century and we built the largest clean coal unit in the world in 1994.   We run the only tidal power plant in North America.  

And this summer we will deploy another first. We will install new in-stream tidal power technology. Emera has a history of innovation and we are very proud of that tradition.

We also have a history of caring about the safety of our employees and the public. Nova Scotia Power is one of the safest utilities in Canada and Bangor Hydro was the first safe utility recognized in New England.  

One of our thermal power plants just marked 1-million man-hours without a lost time injury.    That culture of safety is one we have instilled in all Emera companies.

And most importantly a word about our people.

Of course I’m very proud of them, because of their dedication and professionalism. But it is their dedication to community that stands out.

You could sum up that attitude with one phrase they give where they live and work.

Giving back to our communities is a tradition at Emera. I want you to know the kind of company Emera is and how we view the communities in which we invest and operate. As you saw in the video, our core business is electricity.

Making it and bringing it to customers by investing in people.

Nova Scotia Power was the first, but not the only utility, that Emera owns. We have invested in Bangor Hydro in the state of Maine, and in St. Lucia Electric Services on the island of St. Lucia. Our energy investments extend beyond electricity to gas pipelines, independent power, energy services and support. And of course, the reason I am here today.  We are proud to have recently invested in the Grand Bahama Power Company.

We invested in the Bahamas because of the potential for enormous growth and because we believe we can add value for our customers.  I think of our relationship as a growing partnership. We have much to learn from each other and together we can make things better for our customers here in the Bahamas.

A strong… financially-healthy… electric utility is fundamental to a strong, healthy economy. Emera builds strong healthy utilities.

We maintain them and we invest in them.

We’ve been in the electricity business for more than one-hundred years….and we are here to stay. So how do we build strong healthy utilities? What lessons and experiences do we have that can apply here?

Geography means we share many of the same challenges. Now I can tell you, Nova Scotia is not an island but it’s darn close! In some ways we share your challenges of isolation… and economies of scale.

And we share something else a reliance on fossil fuels. This past year utilities, which depend on fossil fuels, have given their customers a wild ride. For me it has a feeling of déjà vu.

The OPEC oil crisis of the ’70’s was certainly a crisis for Nova Scotia. At that time the majority of electricity in the province was produced from oil at less than $3/bbl.   Suddenly because of forces outside our control we had to change.