North End sewage treatment plant cost estimate surges to $3B

The estimated cost of upgrades to Winnipeg's North End sewage treatment plant has gone up by hundreds of millions of dollars.

The project was already the most expensive infrastructure project in Winnipeg's history. Now, a city report estimates the total cost will be approximately $3 billion, an increase of more than $600 million over the most recent cost estimate of $2.38 billion.

The increased figure comes from a report, set to go before the city's water and waste committee on Friday, requesting an increase of $18.8 million for engineering consulting services on the second phase of the project, which will construct a new biosolids processing facility.

That consulting contract is now expected to cost $63.5 million. 

The report does not go into detail regarding why the total cost of the project has increased. A city spokesperson suggested the final cost could increase further.

"The $3 billion referenced … is a conservative estimate, and not our official update of the estimate," city spokesperson Kalen Qually wrote in an email.

"It was stated for context of how the consultant assignment scope has changed since the assignment was awarded."

The full project was originally estimated in 2015 to cost $795 million.

Qually noted that the budget for the biosolids phase recently increased from $552 million to $1.04 billion, and the third phase of the project — which would remove nutrients from the wastewater — "could increase in a similar fashion."

An updated estimate on the cost of the nutrient removal project is expected in the final quarter of this year.

Water and waste committee chair Coun. Brian Mayes (St. Vital) says he plans to ask city staff at Friday's meeting for an explanation of the cost increase.

"It's a huge discrepancy — $2.4 billion versus $3 billion," he said. "We need a lot better explanation from the staff of where that number is coming from."

The upgrades to the treatment plant were originally called for by the provincial Clean Environment Commission in 2003, and were initially expected to be completed early in the 2010s.

In April, the city wrote a letter to the provincial government requesting an extension to the timeline for completing the project, from 2030 to 2032.

The province says it is still reviewing that request.