Cimco Refrigeration earns $1.8M ice plant project in Vermilion

Vermilion Town Coumcil carried a motion to accept the quote from Cimco Refrigeration for their ice plant replacement project for a total of $1,800,000.

The project has a tentative completion date of September 3, so council remains hopeful that there will be no COVID interruptions, allowing it to go in before the next season.

“It’s great to see we are getting close to the finish line – it’s been roughly seven or eight years this has been in discussion,” said Councillor Robert Pulyk.

“I’d like to congratulate everyone involved. A big thanks to our community for pitching in and supporting this project and to administration for being able to move this along.”

The town received 15 separate configurations from eight different companies and had to weigh every option carefully. They chose Cimco’s screw pump option because it will come with three pumps and thus felt there would be more longevity.

“The screw pump technology is over our current reciprocating technology that’s there,” said Community Services Director, Kevin Lucas.

“When looking at the amount of times we change oil, this option should be more durable and user friendly. Currently we’re having to rebuild a compressor every three years.”

Councillor Clint McCullough said, “Three pumps (one for each ice surface) just seems to make sense. We got about 60 years out of the last ice plant, and we hope to get the same out of this next one, and a large part of that is being able to service them.”

Lucas said the Vermilion Facility Enhancement Board and Think Ice Plant campaign have been working diligently at putting the remaining $305,000 of community fundraising together. He said the Vermilion Rotary Club committed $50,000 over the next three years, and the Vermilion Curling Club’s Grow the Ice Plant fundraiser donated proceeds from a 2020 crop harvested on the Ferbey family’s land.

“There has already been a new plot donated and we’re anticipating another crop fund but we don’t know the growing season. The support from the community has been phenomenal, so I don’t feel going forward it will be a difficult challenge to come up with the rest,” said Lucas.