GNWT says Taltson expansion will address original dam’s legacy

GNWT says Taltson expansion will address original dam’s legacy Alice Twa and Eshana Gohil Friday September 11, 2026 at 6:06am MT Caroline Wawzonek speaks to reporters ahead of the 2026 budget address. Emily Blake/Cabin Radio Share Advertisement. The NWT government says it is “committed to help resolve” the 60-year-old Taltson hydro dam’s impact on Indigenous communities as it prepares an expansion proposal for the federal Major Projects Office. The Deninu Kųę́ First Nation, or DKFN, this week formally withdrew its support for the Taltson hydro expansion and Arctic Corridor projects. The First Nation said it was not consulted and did not provide consent when the original Taltson dam was constructed and has since faced negative impacts. Chief Louis Balsillie said DKFN had experienced a “historical pattern of marginalization” and been largely excluded from the economic benefits of major projects in the area. Advertisement. Advertisement. Caroline Wawzonek, the NWT’s major projects minister, acknowledged DKFN’s claims and said when the dam was created in the 1960s, it flooded the region and destroyed the community of Rocher River, including homes, grave sites and traditional land. Wawzonek told Cabin Radio she has heard from families who “can’t go back to grave sites of parents or grandparents” during discussions about expanding the hydro plant. She said all Indigenous governments who signed a 2021 memorandum of understanding on the expansion project, which includes DKFN, have “that legacy of history” that has not been resolved. A GNWT environmental inspector’s image of the Taltson hydro dam in July 2021. The proposed expansion would increase the hydro facility’s 22-megawatt power generation capacity by 60 megawatts and connect it to communities in the North Slave region like Yellowknife through a transmission line across Great Slave Lake. Advertisement. Advertisement. The expansion is as much an opportunity to do things differently and give Indigenous governments ownership over Taltson hydro, Wawzonek said, as it is to address negative historical impacts. She said the GNWT has helped foster relationships so each Indigenous government that signed on to the 2021 agreement can discuss directly with the Canadian government the harm caused by construction of the initial Taltson facility. DKFN has argued it “will disproportionately bear the burden of any adverse environmental impacts” resulting from the expansion. Wawzonek, however, believes…