Selkirk solar glass plant plans in holding pattern

A prominent manufacturing facility proposed for Selkirk has taken a backseat as trade tensions with the United States persist.

For now, Canadian Premium Sand Inc. is focusing on building a solar glass manufacturing plant in the southern U.S.

“(It) takes a bunch of the risk out that currently exists with the Selkirk operation,” said Glenn Leroux, CPS president and CEO.

The U.S. hub could be paused if American policies are unclear by build time, he added.

CPS, an Alberta-based company, announced plans to build a solar glass manufacturing site in Selkirk four years ago. It has permits to mine silica sand from its wholly-owned Wanipigow quarry leases near Hollow Water First Nation.

Early last year, the Manitoba New Democrats endorsed the plan, which would be — at the time — North America’s only pattern solar glass manufacturing facility. By the end of 2024, CPS had secured $272 million from the provincial and federal governments, provided private-sector cash would come.

The plant is slated to cost $900 million and it’s still in Canadian Premium Sand’s future, Leroux stressed.

“We’re still committed to Manitoba,” he said. “It’s a heck of a resource.”

But the ever-changing trade relationships between the United States and other countries — namely, Canada and China — have made it difficult to pursue the Selkirk project, Leroux said.

The plant needs private-sector funding. Before that can happen, the company must secure offtake agreements, where CPS pre-sells its solar panel glass to customers.

Demand for offtake agreements at the Selkirk site has dampened since a Canada-U.S. trade war erupted, Leroux said. Most, if not all, of Canadian Premium Sand clients are based in the United States; tariffs and threats have bred uncertainty.

“It’s almost impossible to get an offtake agreement committed to … Canadian supply,” Leroux said. “Until that stability is in place, we don’t have a hope, really, of financing,”

Long-term, the Selkirk facility still makes sense, he continued: the cost of manufacturing is relatively low because of electricity and natural gas prices, and the sand is close by.

Leroux is visiting Manitoba later this month for business related to the Selkirk operation.

In the near-term, Canadian Premium Sand is leaning into a proposed U.S. manufacturing facility — one that will likely be built before Selkirk’s, if plans continue as expected.

CPS has circled an abandoned glass manufacturing site in the southern United States. It believes the locale will be able to produce a four gigawatt equivalent of pattern solar glass annually. (The Selkirk plant is expected to produce six GW per year.)

Leroux declined to give the location, saying the current owner doesn’t yet want it public. CPS has negotiated a letter of intent to lease the site for 12 years. There’s an 850,000-square-foot building and existing logistics infrastructure.

CPS estimates the site will cost US$350 million. It’s currently studying the refined cost and construction timeline. Results should be before the board around September, Leroux ballparked.

Already, CPS has agreements with customers covering about half of its U.S. production capacity. Once funding is raised, Leroux said he believes construction could take two years to finish.

Financing from the U.S. government is in flux, Leroux noted: CPS was approved for a US$75 million tax credit through the Department of Energy last year, but legislation may have changed.

“We think (the credit) is still intact,” Leroux said. “We just don’t know.”

Answers should follow the passage of Trump’s budget bill, dubbed the “big, beautiful bill,” Leroux continued. (U.S. Congress passed the bill Thursday.)

Recent proposed amendments to the Inflation Reduction Act repeal incentives to use renewable energy. It could hurt solar panel business, Leroux said.

However, policy amendments in the budget bill would include restricting energy tax credits for those using “prohibited foreign entities,” like companies based in China. That would help business, Leroux noted.

“I can’t emphasize … how complex it is,” he said. “There’s just so many moving parts related to this that weren’t there before.”

CPS may first use American low-iron silica sand upon opening its U.S. facility. Eventually, it aims to ship sand from Manitoba for manufacturing.

Stability between Canada and the U.S. is essential for CPS’s Selkirk plant moving forward, Leroux underscored.

“(We need) confidence that the Trump administration isn’t going to wake up the next morning and change,” he said. “I have no idea … when that’s going to happen.”

Businesses across Manitoba are pausing large investments amid economic uncertainty, noted Elisabeth Saftiuk, Manitoba Chambers of Commerce vice-president of policy and government relations.

She’s hoping a trade deal between Canada and the U.S. will be cemented by July 21, a date politicians have bookmarked.

“Canadian Premium Sand’s decision underscores how disruptive trade tensions and the corresponding uncertainty has been on businesses,” Saftiuk said.

In the short-term, CPS’s path could be a “significant” economic opportunity loss to Manitoba as jobs and tax revenue funnel to the United States, she continued.

Removing interprovincial trade barriers and bolstering Manitoba infrastructure like the Port of Churchill are key buffers against an unreliable American president, she stated.

Selkirk Mayor Larry Johannson said he respects CPS doing business in the United States and hopes both manufacturing plants will come to fruition. The Selkirk site has “readily available” sands, he noted.

gabrielle.piche@winnipegfreepress.com