AltaLink on World Bank Fraud and Corruption No-Bid List

It’s not only AltaLink’s parent company, Montreal-based SNC-Lavalin, that is on the World Bank’s no-bid list under the Bank’s fraud and corruption policy, but AltaLink is on this list as well.

The World Bank’s listing of ineligible firms and individuals, found at this link, reads as follows:

“The firms and individuals listed in Table 1 below are ineligible to be awarded a World Bank-financed contract for the periods indicated because they have been sanctioned under the Bank’s fraud and corruption policy…”

Table 1 includes AltaLink Investment Management Ltd. and AltaLink Management Ltd., both debarred from receiving any World Bank funds from April 17, 2013 to April 17, 2023.

SNC-Lavalin currently owns 100% of AltaLink, and constructs and contract manages most of AltaLink’s new high voltage transmission line projects in Alberta, including the Heartland Transmission Project and the Western Alberta Transmission Line. SNC-Lavalin, it’s past CEO, and many of its past Vice-Presidents, have been alleged to have committed – and in some cases charged with committing – fraud, bribery and money laundering in Canada and internationally. For more details on these allegations and charges and the many countries involved, see this link.

AltaLink delivers power to 85% of Albertans, operating and maintaining about 12,000 km of transmission lines and 280 substations in Alberta. And, the corporation is in the process of building hundreds of additional kilometres of new high voltage lines in Alberta. The need for all this new transmission infrastructure has been seriously questioned by many industry consumers, businesses, residents, municipalities and provincial opposition parties.

Are AltaLink and SNC-Lavalin the types of corporations Albertans want controlling electricity transmission in Alberta? Apparently, the Alberta PC Government, the Alberta Electric System Operator (AESO) and the Alberta Utilities Commission (AUC) see nothing wrong with this. At the same time, the World Bank wants nothing to do with these two corporations.

~ by RETA on November 1, 2013.