This would seem to be as good a time as any to make out a wish list for premier to be, Christy Clark. These are in no particular order.
May we please have back out our right to make a judgment as to matters which happen in our own backyard? Such as Independent Power Producers’ (IPPs) plans for a private power plant? Or a double pipeline for oil from the Tar Sands? It would seem that the wish to develop trumps the right to people’s wishes.
Here is the inconsistency: If a town wants to put in, say, a Walmart, councils listen to people BEFORE making a decision, but the provincial government doesn’t believe in consulting people and only lets the public in when it’s a done deal and government and the company are pretending to let the public make suggestions as to the environmental standards to be followed. Apart from all else, Dear Ms. Clark, no one for a moment thinks that either the government or the company gives – forgive the vulgarity – a fiddler’s fart about the suggestions made.
May we please see copies of the deals forced on BC Hydro for IPPs and have full disclosure of their contents and accompanying documents. Please don’t tell us that they must be kept secret for confidentiality purposes. The whole process is phony – the public knows that and since the government has access to these contracts, we the people respectfully ask that you make them public.
Once they are public, please have a judicial process to determine whether or not these deals are conscionable. No one expects you to cancel a deal just because someone made a good deal through an open process, but if these contracts are, as many suspect, sweetheart deals, we ask that you cancel them and, if necessary, see the IPPs in Court.
With the deepest of respect, again, Ms Clark, may I suggest a bench mark of fairness.
If BC Hydro has been forced or is being forced into what’s called “take or pay” deals, surely this is a point of fairness for an independent adjudicating process. If, as is expected, Hydro has been forced to take power it doesn’t need then either export it at a 50% or more loss or forced to use it and thus pay from 10% on up more than they can produce it themselves these contracts are unconscionable and the contracts should be deemed void.
You probably know, ma’am, that the British Columbia Utilities Commission has said that these contracts “are not in the public interest” of British Columbians. May we, again with respect to this energy policy, suggest you tube it. Get rid of it.
Let me, with deference, move into the environmental issue.
Notwithstanding the assurances given by Finance Minister Colin Hansen, these projects are scarcely “run-of-river”, leaving the flow of the water undisturbed, nor are they small projects run by small companies.
Now again, with respect Ms. Clark, you may not be familiar with Mr. Hansen’s statement but if you Google “Colin Hansen private power” you will see his grandfatherly talk in its entire 1 minute and 51 seconds of untruths. Indeed, I’m sorry to say that Mr. Hansen could not have stated the opposite of the truth with greater particularity. If you wish a hard copy transcript I would be pleased to send you one and, if you so desire, a copy for each member of your caucus.
I certainly don’t wish to seem pedantic or be rude but it must be said.
BC Hydro and the provincial government which you will soon head talk about “appreciable fish values”. These are weasel words designed to imply that none of the Pacific salmon, Chinook, Coho, Chum, Sockeye, Pinks, and Steelhead, is endangered. Quite apart from the fact that this is clearly not the case in many projects, including the Pitt River proposal, other fish are valuable and critical to the ecologies their river sustains. These include Cutthroat Trout (actually the 7th Pacific Salmon), Dolly Varden and Bull Trout (the last two being Chars). There are other species like Arctic Char, Rocky Mountain white fish, sturgeon and so on which also sustain their river’s ecology. If the words “appreciable fish values” are taken on their plain meaning, there’s not a bit of running water in the province that doesn’t contain these values.
I believe – and I hope you don’t think me rude – that an elementary mistake has been made both with IPP projects and fish farms. The “Precautionary Principle”, so important to fair science and good legislation, has been upended so that instead of the user of the water being required to prove the environmental safety of the proposal, the onus has been shifted to the public. I’m sure if you took a moment to reflect on this – and I can provide you with loads of evidence that this is happening – you would immediately reinstate the Precautionary Principle. One name I can give you now: the highly respected John Fraser, who could hardly be called a leftist, is an excellent person to contact on this point.
Still on the subject of the environment, so far as I’m aware there is no process, no responsible part of government, to evaluate the totality of the environmental disruptions that are permitted – the aggregate impact if you will. This should happen and should be done by an independent body with the chairperson appointed by the Legislature and reporting to them.
Again, with deep deference, may I suggest that these issues will be very much in play from now until the next election. You simply cannot wish them away. You have two options as I see it – you can pretend that these matters are all unimportant or you can take immediate and firm steps to deal with them. We at The Common Sense Canadian devoutly and respectfully urge you to follow the latter course.
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British Columbians mourn the death of a great citizen, Allan Williams, QC.
Others knew Allan much better than I. I served in cabinet with him for five years and I can tell you that no decisions were taken until he had said his piece, such was his constant wisdom.
Allan served in local politics with distinction and was an MLA for 17 years and served as a highly respected Minister of Labour and as Attorney-General during some difficult times which he dealt with firmly and courageously.
One of the highest compliments I’ve received was when he asked me to be guest speaker at his annual constituency meeting.
It’s shocking to me that Allan never was awarded an Order of BC. Cato the elder put it this way: “After I’m dead I’d rather have people ask why I have no monument than why I have one”. The Order of BC can grant honours posthumously and should do so.
To Marjorie, his wife of 62 years, and his family I know I speak for all BC when I say about Allan, “Well done thou good and faithful servant.“
There has been considerable haste in dishing out IPP licences, somewhat less so for actual development of licences. Most licences are speculative and tentative, that is, some licences are intended for resale, the tentative part is waiting to see if there will be profit. Licences that are actually developed are a gamble, but a tangible one that insures some kind of recompense should BC Hydro’s “must buy” contracts be overturned. Not so much the undeveloped licences.
Of course neither is “profitable” without the “must buy” contracts. The “not in the public interest” part is when the public owners of BC Hydro have to pay a premium for their own power in order that private interests can “profit” by charging Hydro much more for their uncompetitive power than Hydro can produce for itself.
Developed licences go some way to entrench this “not-in-the-public-interest” scam. But the marriage of environmental and affordability issues with BC’s current political tumult is fast making Hydro one of the biggest issues.
We all wait to see if the NDP wins and overturns these sham contracts. Then the speculators will see if they got something for nothing, or nothing for nothing.
Also nice to see would be a clear explanation from our friend Casador as to why exactly we require these run of river projects.
The numbers are very clear; we do not require the power produced by these projects at that time of year. Why then do British Columbians need to pay for IPP’s to be developed?
What is this power for Casador? Please provide a clear explanation because we are all so collectively dumb.
Maybe if people would denounce the scam the quest for “clean” power is built on, namely man-made global warming…now known as “warm makes more cold”, it would be easier to shut down RR boondoggles.
I invite all you intelligent victims of the global propaganda campaign to convince you that the 0.00038% part of the atmosphere that is CO2 is capable of changing climate to inform yourselves about the con game.
SIX THINGS EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE:
1. The earth is cooling.
2. The Sun causes climate change.
3. Al Gore was wrong about C02.
4. Violent weather isn’t getting worse.
5. It’s been hotter.
6. Climate computer models are proven wrong.
http://www.friendsofscience.org/
Technically, definition of dam is “ a barrier preventing the flow of water” “a barrier built across a watercourse for impounding water”. Pretty much covers that. Rivers are diverted for many km through penstocks. To meet 5% mean annual flow, water is pumped back up to where it used to flow naturally (before the dam was built), using electricity that was just generated. A “who’s on first” scenario. Use the Tyson Lake and Stlixwim projects on the Sunshine Coast for example.
Can’t visit the Ashlu, it’s gone.
“Removes the underpinnings of the entire 2008 LTAP” is pretty inclusive. Of 68 IPP’s noted, 23 are not hydroelectric and do not present the same issues, other than loss of public control of resources to foreign corps and increased costs due to profits margins required by these corps.
If the hydroelectric IPP’s are such a small part of the LTAP, why are they being considered at all? Other than political direction (as stated in the decision). They are a vehicle to generate (pun intended) profits and tax free carbon trading credits for private companies. Cumulative effects of so many, far from existing powerlines, producing for a short time does not balance the public good
LTAP is BC Hydro’s Long Term Acquisition Plan – filed from time-to-time.
ENGO is Environmental Non-Government Organization
To see the decision re LTAP that my critic referenced, google BCUC, go into “orders and decisons”, put in dates June to August 2009, and you will find the July 2009 LTAP decision. I believe many people commenting on this decision have just taken the word of anti-IPP groups and have never actually read it (it’s wonderful if you have insomnia). The claim that the decision says IPPs are not in the public interest is pure fiction. You can argue IPPs may or may not be in the public interest as you wish, BUT the decision neither says (a matter of fact) nor implies (a matter of fair opinion) that.
What is LTAP?
What is ENGO?
If you read the decision, and I have several times, you will find that IPP is only one supply component of LTAP; LTAP is about immensely more than some IPPs. The BCUC rejected the LTAP, not IPPs. On page 131 of the LTAP decision, the BCUC gives four reasons for its rejection of this LTAP; problems with IPPs (or even that word) are not among them. To the contrary, at page 124 of the decision, the BCUC gives a soft blessing to 68 IPP proposals. The fact that the rejection of LTAP made it impossible for the BCUC to determine firm power requirements is an obvious outfall of LTAP rejection and is not confirmation of Rafe’s claim.
Re dams – I refer to the huge BCH dams as “traditional”. “Run-of-river” is simply the name given projects that divert a portion of a river’s flow to a power plant; the remaining flow is not used for power. You can visit Ashlu to see this. Technically, they use weirs, not dams across the river as in a traditional project which dams a whole river.
To Casador,
Good to see you acknowledge these projects do make use of dams….though not sure what criteria one would use to differentiate between traditional and non-traditional. Please quantify the parameters used in order to make the decision of traditional or non-traditional……height? reservoir capacity? material used in construction?
The term “run of river” is not correct, these projects use large tunnels bored into the bottom of alpine lakes in order to supplement flows that do not naturally occur at the times we need the power the most.
Please see p 131 of the BCUC Decision dated July 27, 2009. Section 6.7 Summary Consideration of the 2008 LTAP….Rafe should be able to determine if the below excerpt qualifies for the 100.00.
The Commission Panel believes that the parts of the LTAP it has rejected represent a level of
individual and collective materiality that removes the underpinnings of the entire 2008 LTAP.
Accordingly the Commission Panel finds that BC Hydro’s 2008 LTAP is not in the public interest
and rejects it.
It would be nice to see the BCUC document that said IPP contracts are “not in the public interest”. This false claim appears often. I even offered some of the ENGOs $100 if they could produce this mythical document – I still have my $100.
And Rafe, who ever claimed that ANY hydro plant, be it run of river or other, leaves the water flow “undistrubed”. But run of river leaves it far less disturbed than a traditional impoundment dam.