I can't speak on behalf of the province. We're obviously running the lower Churchill project as a business, and I'm sitting back from that situation.
At the request of our shareholder I've been asked, from a business commercial perspective, to take this project and come together with two or three combinations of options to produce financing and give us a reasonable return, as well as protect our upside in the long haul with respect to what we could make on this project.
Our job is to bring those pieces forward, lay them in front of the province, and give them two to three options to hopefully say, this works, this works, and this works; which one suits you from a policy perspective? At that point we'll be indifferent, because hopefully we will put together a business case where all of those options will be financeable and will provide reasonable returns.
As far as the loan guarantees go, that is a discussion between the province and the federal government. I think it has been publicized. The papers have been pretty clear. There has been a request by the province. The Prime Minister indicated he would support the project in that fashion. As far as Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro goes, that's a piece of business we've incorporated into our business case. There's no question about that.
As far as pulling the trigger on that piece of it goes, it's there and we're incorporating it, but it's not something we're saying must be signed right now. I need to get these business cases together and be able to demonstrate to the federal government that there's a loan guarantee commitment there. We appreciate that, but this is the type of project that's a tremendous investment. It's a tremendous investment for Newfoundland, but it's also a tremendous investment for the country. We want to make the business case and show why it's good for the country. We want to say that this is not a situation where we're looking for a handout or assistance. This is a huge investment opportunity for the country, and we want to present it in that fashion.
We hope and expect that the federal government and financiers and anyone else who is constantly knocking on our doors to invest in this project because it's such a good project, are going to look at this and say it's something they want to invest in because it just makes so much sense.