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Less than 10 years after Saskatoon’s Remai Modern art gallery opened, the boilers that maintain the precise conditions needed to preserve artwork in the building must be replaced.
A city council committee heard Tuesday that replacing the steam boilers, which are described as “aging” in a report from director of facilities management Pam Hamoline, will cost $1.5 million.
The money will come from a reserve fund intended to pay for upgrades like this; it represents nearly a quarter of the money that has been contributed to the fund by the Remai Modern.
Hamoline said the boilers operate continuously at the art gallery, which opened in October 2017 after delays and rising costs, and that has taken a toll on them.
“Independent engineering inspections confirm that both boilers are deteriorating,” Hamoline told the environment, utilities and corporate services committee.
“One pressure vessel is leaking and the other shows early signs of failure. The model is obsolete, the manufacturer support has ended and meaningful long-term repair is not feasible.”
Hamoline’s report says the Technical Safety Authority of Saskatchewan advised the gallery in late 2023 that the boiler plant would require 24/7 supervision without an upgrade.
The constant supervision costs the gallery about $150,000 a year and will not be needed if the boilers are replaced, the report says.
Commercial boilers usually operate for more than 20 years, according to Hamoline’s report, but the constant operation of the boilers at Remai Modern has shortened their lifespan. Hamoline said the city administration is not surprised by the need to replace the boilers.
“This facility is very unique and unique to North America as well,” Hamoline said.
Other heating systems in city buildings operate seasonally and offer the opportunity to perform maintenance when they’re shut down, she said.
Coun. Troy Davies, who pointed out that he was on council when the art gallery was being built, said he’s heard from residents about the situation with the gallery’s boilers.
While there’s no direct budget impact from the proposed replacement of the boilers, Remai Modern receives an unusually high contribution from taxpayers for a city the size of Saskatoon: $6.6 million this year and $6.7 million next year.
In 2023, nearly a decade after construction started, city hall revealed that the final cost of the gallery was $111.3 million, including the parking garage underneath it. When the project was officially announced in 2009, the cost was estimated at $55 million.
