The Vancouver-based company planning to buy the idle NewPage Port Hawkesbury paper mill in Cape Breton has reached a tentative energy agreement with Nova Scotia Power.

Pacific West Commercial Corp. says it plans to submit the agreement for approval to the Nova Scotia Utilities and Review Board.

Earlier this month, unionized workers at the mill in Point Tupper, N.S., endorsed a new contract.

Close to 86 per cent of union members who cast ballots voted in favour of a deal that would see the layoff of about 320 employees of the 550-member workforce.

Premier Darrell Dexter has said that once the electricity rates are set, the government will start discussing other issues, such as Crown timber rights.

The government has already announced up to $30 million to support timber operations in the Port Hawkesbury area and to help keep the plant in a so-called hot idle state.

It has been closed since September.