B.C. First Nations chiefs recently travelled to Ottawa to urge the federal government to pull the plug on the costliest infrastructure project in the country. At an estimated $7.9 billion and growing, the proposed Site C Dam on the beautiful Peace River in northeastern B.C. has been criticized for spiralling costs, questions about whether the electricity it would produce is even needed, and concerns about the environmental and social impacts of flooding thousands of hectares of prime farmland, irreplaceable cultural sites and wildlife habitat. The government is expected to make a decision in October.

[quote]If built, Site C would violate First Nations’ rights under Treaty 8, rendering them irrelevant to the point of mockery.[/quote]

Treaty 8 rights at risk

While in Ottawa, First Nations leaders also reminded politicians that the Peace River Valley is the traditional territory of the Dane-zaa, and Canada has clear obligations to them under the 1899 Treaty 8. Years of case law, as well as the recent Supreme Court of Canada Tsilhqot’in decision, confirm that First Nations must have a say on industrial development on their lands.

If built, Site C would violate First Nations’ rights under Treaty 8, rendering them irrelevant to the point of mockery. Treaty 8 guarantees First Nations the right to hunt and fish “for as long as the sun shines, the rivers flow and the grass grows.” But are treaty promises even worth the paper they’re written on when hunting grounds will be drowned under water, moose populations decimated and fish contaminated with toxic methyl mercury from decaying vegetation?

Site C would also obliterate hundreds of graves and ceremonial sites, and so hinder cultural and traditional practices. Hunting, fishing, collecting medicinal plants and visiting sacred sites are activities by which First Nations maintain their cultural and spiritual identity and connection to the land. How long will Treaty 8 First Nations be able to sustain a vibrant, living culture when the dam devastates their land and communities?

“Significant adverse effects”

These questions are not hypothetical. A Joint Review Panel, convened by the federal and B.C. governments, concluded Site C would significantly harm Treaty 8 First Nations. The panel found the dam would have “significant adverse effects” on fishing, hunting and trapping, and on other traditional land uses — and not just in B.C., but downstream where the Peace River enters Alberta. According to the panel, most of these adverse effects would be impossible to mitigate.

Peace Valley’s unique natural assets

In standing up for the Peace Valley and saying “no” to the Site C Dam, Treaty 8 First Nations’ leaders are acting not only on their own behalf, but also for other Canadians, including local farming communities with which they have co-existed for generations. Together, these rural communities are reminding the government and the rest of us that the Peace Valley offers immense bounty and natural wealth through fishing, hunting and potential for food production, and is too valuable to be sacrificed for industrial development.

A recent study by David Suzuki Foundation economists also found that, each year, the Peace River Valley and surrounding areas provide billions of dollars in beneficial ecological services like pollination, water filtration and flood control.

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The Peace Valley has productive soils and a unique microclimate ideally suited to producing a wide range of crops. According to three senior agricultural experts who testified before the Joint Review Panel, the east-west Peace River Valley’s deep alluvial soils, long northern daylight in the growing season and microclimate for agriculture could produce fruits and vegetables to meet the nutritional needs of over a million people a year!

The California drought this past summer reminds us that relying on imported food makes us vulnerable. B.C. already imports over 57 per cent of the fresh vegetables British Columbians consume each year, much of which could be grown in the province. The situation is similar elsewhere in Canada.

Recent court cases are a wake-up call for politicians. When it comes to decisions that could irrevocably affect them, the days of running roughshod over First Nations are over. B.C.’s Treaty 8 First Nations have already borne the brunt of decades of industrial development on their lands, including two earlier Peace River dams. They have also found common cause with local communities fighting to save family farms and ranches.

Building the Site C Dam and flooding the Peace Valley would be more than folly; it would be a tragedy for First Nations, agriculture and the environment.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Ontario and Northern Canada Director-General Faisal Moola.

By Ken Farquharson

The Similkameen River valley provides one of the most popular and scenic travel routes in BC. The campsites strung along the river, swimming at Bromley Rock, the old mining town of Hedley, the fruit stands of Keremeos, the wineries of Cawston, and the transition to the sage brush of the Okanagan, make for a varied and memorable BC travel experience. The river provides kayak and canoe runs for both the expert and the novice, and is one of only two free flowing transboundary rivers in southern BC that is not either managed for hydropower or in protected status of some sort.

However all is not serene in the Similkameen Valley, and the cause of this is the curious lack of interest of the BC government to protect the public interest in proposals to change the Similkameen River, the heart of the Valley.

BC govt sitting on sidelines of proposed US dam

The story starts in 2007 when the Okanogan Public Utility District, the small utility serving Okanogan County in Washington, applied to the US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to study a dam proposed at Shankers Bend in Washington, which would flood the BC section of the Similkameen valley as far upstream as Cawston.

Given the lesson learned from the argument over the Skagit Valley from 1969 to 1983 that it is essential to participate early in the regulatory process, the Okanagan Nation Alliance (ONA) and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society ( CPAWS) immediately filed with FERC as intervenors. The BC government sat back, and, although Minister Barry Penner  was made well aware of the potential impacts in BC, declined to file as an intervenor leaving it to the ONA, CPAWS and the Regional District of Okanagan-Similkameen  to register their objections. The PUD eventually withdrew its application.

Fortis applies for 165m-high dam on Similkameen

In 2013, Fortis BC, the local utility, applied for permits to conduct studies on the Crown land required for the reservoir ( 20km long) and the dam site  for a 165m-high concrete dam in the Similkameen Canyon, 15km upstream from Princeton, with a generation capacity of 45-55MW. If the final proposed capacity is below 50MW, the project may not be required to go through the environmental assessment process.  As the plant is proposed as a market generator, it would not have to be reviewed by the BC Utilities Commission, as the cost would not be rolled into the utility’s rate base. It is possible the project could escape review entirely.

Fortis conceded in a meeting with the Regional District on 22 May this year that the project may not be economical based on generation alone and that it had already approached downstream parties in the US with interests in generation and irrigation as to whether they would be prepared to pay for the downstream benefits created by the project.

This action was confirmed by information that the Washington State Department of Ecology had allocated $1.6M in its budget for 2015-17 for a payment to Fortis for “Evaluation of a proposed hydropower and water supply….shared cost and water supply for Washington and Oregon” – no mention of BC needs.

This allotment was confirmed by the Director, Office of the Columbia River, Washington Department of Ecology, to Steve Arstad, editor of the Keremeos Review, on 9 June, when he advised that

[quote]Fortis was interested in developing a contract with us for scheduled releases of some of the water stored behind the dam. The timing of the releases would coincide with when water would be needed in Washington for instream and out-of-stream uses. The term of the contract would be for 50 years.[/quote]

It is clear, therefore, that if the project proceeds, control of the river would pass to Fortis and downstream US interests.

Fortis would be sole beneficiary of agreements

The Columbia River Treaty gave BC half the value of the downstream benefits in the US from provision of water storage in BC. The province took that money for itself. Queries to the BC Comptroller of Water Resources resulted in advice that, for this project, the province was leaving Fortis to negotiate any downstream agreements, and that Fortis would be the sole beneficiary of these agreements.  It should be noted that any agreement made between Fortis and US interests will be between private parties and thus not subject to Freedom of Information requests.

The BC Water Regulations allow the province to collect a fee from any licensee benefiting from payments from downstream generators in the US for benefits received for power generation, but have no such provision for benefits generated from flood control or water storage.

Province derelict of duty

In respect to this project, the province appears derelict in its management of the river in a number of ways, permitting Fortis to negotiate contracts that would mean control passing to US interests, not ensuring that the province would benefit from all downstream benefits, and lastly not having done the work to determine the future water needs of the BC section of the Similkameen Valley before contracts may be signed for water storage for US interests. It is possible BC interests could be locked out of access to such storage if it had all been negotiated away by Fortis.

There is already enough evidence to state that Fortis should be advised now by the province that this project is not in the public interest. Should the province continue to dither, there is a real risk that BC could lose control of this valued river, a public resource, for a sub-marginal project, with the benefits going solely to the shareholders of Fortis and downstream interests in Washington. The people of BC surely deserve better from our politicians and bureaucrats in planning for the future of this beautiful river and valley.

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The Joint Review Panel into the $10 Billion* proposed Site C Dam released its findings on the project today.

In a summary (read full report here), it stated:

[quote]The benefits are clear. Despite high initial costs, and some uncertainty about when the power would be needed, the Project would provide a large and long – term increment of firm energy and capacity at a price that would benefit future generations. [/quote]

But there is nothing clear about the panel’s report – which leaves the waters as muddy as the banks of the mighty Peace River.

Panel offers more questions than answers

Says Andrea Morison of the Peace Valley Environment Association, “We see this as a recommendation, and there are many significant concerns that the panel has brought forward, starting with the need for the project.”

On that note, the panel conceded that BC Hydro has not adequately demonstrated the need for the project – which it clearly hasn’t. It also noted a list of unanswered environmental questions and found that “the Project would significantly affect the current use of land and resources for traditional purposes by Aboriginal peoples.”

Locating the dam within the broad web of industrial activities which already cover the region – with many more on the horizon – the panel stated, “whether the Project proceeds or not, there is a need for a government-led regional environmental assessment including a baseline study and the establishment of environmental thresholds for use in evaluating the effects of multiple, projects…The Panel recommends that the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency undertake, on an urgent basis, an update of its guidance on cumulative effects assessment.”

And yet, in the big picture, the review held up the project as a net environmental benefit – apparently favouring its purported climate benefits over the obvious ecological impacts it carries. “It would do this in a way that would produce a vastly smaller burden of greenhouse gases than any alternative save nuclear power, which B.C. has prohibited.” Unless, of course, we don’t need the power at all…

Further complicating things is the fact that in the new era of environmental assessment in Canada, the panel itself only makes recommendations – “The decision on whether the Project proceeds is made by elected officials,” it notes. A final decision from senior levels of government on the project isn’t expected for 6 months.

This has the effect of offloading the accountability for the panel’s findings onto other parties, and it has gone the extra mile in that regard, with its “on the one hand, on the other hand” language.

That said, at first glance, the document would appear to be an overall endorsement for the project – and that’s certainly how the Liberal government will interpret it.

Panel raised hopes through hearing

The panel offered the dam’s critics some hope throughout December and January hearings in northeast BC, appearing to give proponent BC Hydro a hard time on issues ranging from the impossible challenge for citizens to engage meaningfully with its 15,000-page technical application in just one month’s time, to the utility’s dismissal of important agricultural values in the Peace River Region that would be flooded.

Yet its final verdict, for the most part, fits into a pattern of rubber stamps issued by environmental assessments for major industrial projects like the recently-approved Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline. As I noted in these pages following that decision, there is a troubling trend in these assessments – the inevitable conclusion that the purported economic benefits somehow outweigh the project’s impacts.

In the case of Site C, having reviewed the project closely for years now myself, it is clear that this is simply not the case. Like the Enbridge project before it, it is not incumbent on the assessor to support these conclusions with proof.

Here are 4 big reasons why the benefits of Site C do not outweigh the costs:

1. There is simply no need for the power

Throughout this latest period of Site C’s 30-year saga, we’ve heard the justification for the project morph into radically different permutations. First, we were told Site C would power 500,000 homes in BC. Except, as we’ve repeatedly demonstrated in these pages, that’s not true. BC’s power consumption has flatlined. We’re now in surplus power position for the longterm foreseeable future. Site C has nothing to do with BC’s homes.

Next, we heard it was essential to power the government’s much-vaunted liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry on the coast – a notion that was undermined by Hydro’s befuddled attempt to address LNG in its latest energy planning document. It is clear the utility has no idea how to handle LNG and Site C is but a minor, hypothetical piece of the puzzle.

Finally, during the hearing itself, the reason changed to exporting excess power to California – raising the question: how can we trust a government and utility that are continually changing their story on the dam.

Moreover, this presents a bizarre irony: At a time when we can no longer depend on cheap agricultural imports from California due to the extreme drought it faces, we are now proposing to flood some of our best farmland in order to export power to California. Go figure.

2. Flooding enough farmland to feed a million people

On that note, as the panel heard loud and clear from esteemed agrologists Wendy Holm and Evelyn Wolterson – contrary to BC Hydro’s assertions – the Peace Valley contains some of Canada’s best farmland. The 30,000-plus acre tract that would be flooded or disrupted by the dam could feed a million people. That’s a quarter of BC’s citizens. In the words of Wolterson:

[quote] It is our opinion that the public interest is better served [by] agriculture and other uses for this valley, rather than a hundred years of power production…Power has other alternatives; agriculture doesn’t.[/quote]

Good point. Too bad it fell largely on deaf ears.

3. Get ready for huge cost overruns

Any cost-benefit analys depends partly on knowing the real cost side of the equation. Clearly, there are significant environmental and food security costs from the proposed dam, but what about the financial costs?

The panel rightly acknowledged doubts about the accuracy of Hydro’s $8 Billion price tag for the project. Don’t forget, this is a government whose overseeing of large capital projects makes the NDP’s fast ferry fiasco look like the paragon of good project management. From the convention centre to the stadium roof to the Port Mann Bridge, the BC Liberal government boasts a track record of cost overruns routinely in the 50-100% range.

Couple that with the notorious inflation for dams around the world (27% on average, according to the World Bank), and we’ll call Site C $10 Billion – conservatively. This on top of deepening debt and deficits from this government – not to mention skyrocketing power bills, which will keep rising as a result of this project.

4. Serious grassroots and First Nations opposition

Local “Cowboys and Indians” – the landowners and Treaty 8 First Nations whose farms and territories would be flooded by the dam – have made it clear where they stand on this project. They’ve put themselves on the line many times before to stop the dam – and consistently won.

The panel’s ruling – muddy though it is – will likely be embraced by the Liberal Government as an approval, which puts First Nations and citizens on a path to conflict with the province in the coming months and years.

Whether it be from the lack of need for the project, the lingering geotechnical challenges it faces (though they won’t admit it, Hydro still doesn’t really know how to build the thing), the financial burden it presents to a province already deeply in debt, the growing awareness of the importance of food security in an era of climate change, or the opposition it will face on the ground, this dam is still a long, long way from being built.

VANCOUVER – B.C. New Democratic Party Leader John Horgan is raising concerns about the proposed Site C hydroelectric dam, just days before an environmental review on the project becomes public.

The dam proposed by BC Hydro would be the third on northeastern B.C.’s Peace River and would flood about 55 square kilometres of land along 83 kilometres of river valley.

The Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency conducted hearings in December and January, submitted its report to the federal government last week and is expected to post the document online Thursday.

Horgan says it’s a good project, except for the fact B.C. doesn’t need the energy, First Nations oppose it and the dam would destroy so much agricultural land.

He says he wants a third party to answer some legitimate questions like when will the province actually need the power and how much should the people pay for it.

The Crown utility has said the dam is a clean, cost-effective source of much-needed electricity for British Columbia.

“The BC Liberals have made a mess of BC Hydro,” says Horgan.

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We have 28 per cent rate increases coming down the pipe. We have deferred debt. We have long-term debt, and we have projects that are wildly over budget.

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