Peace Valley farmers and outspoken critics of the Site C dam Ken and Arlene Boon say BC Hydro intends to force them from their third-generation family farm by the end of this year even though the dam would not flood their land until 2024.

The Boons received the unexpected news from their lawyer, following a conversation the lawyer had with officials from BC Hydro’s Properties division.

“It was a shocker,” Ken Boon, says. “We didn’t know they wanted us out by Christmas.”

Boon says if they refuse to sell their farm to BC Hydro it will be expropriated for the “re-alignment” of Highway 29 away from the Site C flood zone, a two-year construction project that BC Hydro says must begin in 2017.  

For reasons that have never been explained to the Boons’ satisfaction, BC Hydro intends to route the new highway right through the couples’ farm buildings and home. The highway would also destroy a renovated log house where Arlene’s 81-year-old mother lives.

“Why are we discussing the highway relocation in year one of a nine year project?” asks Arlene Boon. “As a property owner you don’t have any rights. If BC Hydro or Highways want to expropriate you, they will.”

Arlene Boon stands on her property near a BC Hydro highway marker. The highway's centre line is expected to run directly between the Boon's house and the wood shed to its left. Photo: Sarah Cox

Arthur Hadland, a former Peace River Regional District director, says he believes BC Hydro wants the Boons off their land by the end of the year because Ken is the outspoken president of the Peace Valley Landowners Association. The association, which represents 70 landowners in the Peace River Valley, has a court case against Site C, one of four on-going legal challenges against the $8.8 billion dam.

“It’s divide and conquer. The landowners have been a pretty solid group. But just like any organization if you cut the head off you will lose the power. They just want to diminish the power of the landowners,” Hadland says.  

BC Hydro spokesperson Dave Conway says the Crown corporation cannot discuss its negotiations with individual landowners in the Peace River Valley. Conway confirms, however, that BC Hydro is having “conversations” with landowners along a stretch of the valley called Bear Flat/Cache Creek, where the Boons live.

BC Hydro is “moving up the valley” and Cache Creek is “one of the first areas affected by the highway re-alignment,” Conway says.

Asked if BC Hydro will expropriate the Boon’s farm and other nearby farms if owners refuse to sell, Conway says BC Hydro has the legal authority to expropriate land.

“But that’s not the way we like to work. We like to come to a negotiated settlement with people,” Conway said.  

Arlene Boon says there can never be agreement when landowners consider their property to be priceless for reasons other than monetary value.

“We are being forced off. When you are not a willing seller you’re being forced to put a price on something [that] is not for sale and in your mind would never be for sale.”

The Boons say it is curious that BC Hydro said nothing about an end-of-the-year deadline for acquiring land during a March 10 meeting the Crown corporation held with them and about a dozen other Bear Flat/Cache Creek landowners. The couple heard the news from their lawyer less than two weeks after that meeting. 

The meeting aimed to provide landowners with information about the Site C highway re-alignment, which will entail re-construction of 8.5 kilometres of the highway in six different sections and four new bridges across rivers that would be flooded by the dam’s reservoir. The reservoir would stretch for 107 kilometres along the Peace River and its tributaries, almost the same distance as driving from Victoria to Nanaimo.

Last year, 70 Peace Valley landowners affected by Site C asked BC Hydro for a common framework agreement for discussing land acquisition issues, a framework Ken Boon describes as  “a general guideline so that everybody would be treated more or less the same.”

“Hydro said no,” says Boon.

Following the surprise news from their lawyer that they may have to relinquish their farm by the end of this year, the Boons asked BC Hydro to send them written information about the timeline for highway relocation, a construction project that BC Hydro documents say will cost $530 million.

In response, BC Hydro sent the Boons and other landowners a two-page information bulletin in May. The bulletin, dated May 2016, says BC Hydro “is acquiring land in the Bear Flat/Cache Creek area in 2016 in preparation for the start of highway realignment work.” It says BC Hydro evaluated two highway alignment options: a corridor along the reservoir and an inland corridor.

Hydro says it chose the corridor along the reservoir because it would increase the length of passing opportunities for drivers, has fewer technical challenges, better geological conditions, affects a smaller area of private land, and has “less impact” on agricultural land.

But Colin Meek, one of the farmers who would lose a third-generation family farm to the highway re-alignment, points out that losing less agricultural land is of little value “when you get rid of the farmer.” Meek and his partner Leslee Jardine live in a house that would become the centre line of the new highway, according to surveying stakes recently put in the ground by BC Hydro contractors.

“They just keep the pressure on,” Meek says.

Colin Meek and Leslee Jardine stand in their hemp heart field. Photo: Sarah Cox

Meek and Jardine are awaiting organic certification of their Class 1 farmland, which is among the 6,500 hectares of farmland that will be destroyed by Site C, and an additional 6,000 hectares that may be lost. They grow commercial hemp for food (hemp hearts) and have a large market garden where they cultivate dozens of types of vegetables and herbs, including eggplant, peppers and tomatoes.

Meek says someone should assess the psychological impacts of Site C on Peace Valley residents, whom he says are suffering from trauma and stress as a result of the threat of losing their homes and farms and putting up with Hydro contractors drilling deep holes beside their houses and in their fields. “Try waking up in the middle of the night because you’re having a dream that a CAT is going through your bedroom.”

Based on advice from their lawyer, the Boons and other landowners affected by the highway re-routing recently signed access agreements with BC Hydro, allowing the Crown corporation to enter their land for geotechnical, wildlife and heritage studies in exchange for modest financial compensation. Ken Boon says they didn’t have a choice because Hydro has the legal right to access their land with or without their agreement.

In a letter to affected landowners, BC Hydro says different teams on their land will consist of up to eight people per team, and that equipment on their property could “include a drill rig or excavator, pump, compressor, and water tank. In addition to the drill, there may be one or two support vehicles.”

The letter also points to the haste with which work is being conducted. “To complete the work on your property as quickly as possible, it is anticipated that investigations would occur up to 10 to 12 hours a day, and up to 5 to 7 days a week, with flexibility to accommodate residents and businesses.”

.@bchydro says: Merry Christmas! Now you're homeless. https://t.co/w01DAqYo1R @Sarah_K_Cox @maryforbc @christyclarkbc #bcpoli #SiteC

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) June 16, 2016

The Boons were shocked to see a map of their land that has 73 drilling sites marked on it, including one right beside their farmhouse and others in their riverside fields that are so fertile that the overlying layers of topsoil — among the richest in B.C. — are 15 feet deep. The topsoil sits on gravel, which the Boons fear will be excavated to assist in highway construction.

In recent weeks, the Boons have had to deal with drilling rigs, water trucks, a spill in one of their planted fields, contractors whom Ken Boon says “should be required to take a course in Sensitivity 101,” and two security investigators parked in a truck at their end of their driveway without the Boon’s permission or knowledge.

The Boons say the investigators parked on their driveway were the same two men who compiled evidence against them and four other Peace Valley residents for BC Hydro’s on-going civil law suit against some of the people involved in a two-month winter camp at the historic Rocky Mountain Fort site.

As a result of the civil law suit initiated by BC Hydro, the Boons and others named in the suit live with the constant threat of having their assets seized — including their farmland and houses — should they interfere with Hydro’s efforts for highway relocation and other developments associated with the Site C project. The suit, which has some of the hallmarks of a Strategic Law Suit Against Public Participation, or SLAPP suit, is the first time B.C. legal experts are aware of a publicly-owned corporation taking such action. 

Image: Farmer Ken Boon on his land. Photo: Jayce Hawkins.

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First Nations women camping at the Rocky Mountain Fort site and opposing ongoing construction for the Site C Dam say they feel intimidated and harassed by male security guards and “investigators” with ties to BC Hydro.

Women at the encampment told DeSmog Canada small groups of men arrive on site at least twice a day to film the predominantly female campers and repetitively question them about their intentions.

“There would be three or four of them with cameras and all males,” says Helen Knott, a Treaty 8 member and Fort St. John social worker who has sometimes been alone in the bush when security guards and investigators suddenly appear. “It was intimidating…as a young indigenous women coming into daily contact with men with cameras in the middle of nowhere.”

Knott has been camping at the historic fort site since New Year’s Eve when she and other Treaty 8 members, along with Peace Valley farmers and business owners, set up a wilderness camp to maintain a presence in an old-growth forest on Crown land that is slated to be clear cut and flooded for the Site C dam.

One group of rotating campers keeps a fire burning throughout the day near the bridge over the Moberly River that was constructed by BC Hydro during the Christmas holidays in preparation for logging. The forest is prime habitat for the blue-listed fisher and migrating songbirds, and is used by Treaty 8 members and elders for spiritual purposes and to collect plants for traditional medicines.

Helen Knott at the encampment. Photo: Sarah Cox.

Another group remains at the camp a 20-minute walk away, at the site of the first European fort in mainland B.C., where the Beaver people came to trade furs with early explorers and voyageurs in the late 1700s and early 1800s. The fort site, along with 42 other heritage sites along 107 kilometres of the Peace River and its tributaries, would be flooded by the $8.8 billion Site C dam project.

Knott says she has experienced some uncomfortable moments during the twice-daily questioning, during which security “investigators” film the women without their permission and ask for the names of the people present, how long they will stay and if they intend to allow or prevent “timber harvesting” in the area.

No logging has taken place since January 7 when the campers, who call themselves the Treaty 8 “Stewards of the Land,” began to maintain a constant vigil from dawn until dark, in temperatures as low as minus 25 Celsius, after old-growth cottonwoods were logged that day when they briefly returned to the fort site to get food.

“The other day because I wasn’t giving him (the investigator) the answers that he wanted, his voice started getting a little bit louder and he was talking over me,” Knott said. “He said ‘you’re not answering my questions,’ because I answered his question with a question. I asked him, ‘Are you still going to infringe on my treaty rights?’ And he started talking over me and his face got red and finally he just calmed down and he just walked away…He was getting worked up.”

Knott says she and others have asked the security investigators many times not to come into the camp where women are sleeping, eating and using an outdoor toilet, but they continue to do so at least twice a day, filming the campers standing outside their tent and cooking and sleeping huts, and asking the same questions again and again. “That is . . .basically borderline harassment especially when we’ve asked [them not to]…And they say this is what we were instructed to do and we say ‘well, it’s not okay.’”

Helen Knott and Yvonne Tupper do sunrise yoga on the newly-constructed bridge over the Moberly River as security guards watch and film. Photo: Sarah Cox.

The security guards and investigators wear jackets emblazoned with “Saulteau Safety and Security.” The Saulteau First Nation belongs to B.C.’s Treaty 8 Tribal Association, and the Nation was once strongly opposed to the dam’s construction. But following a 2015 band council election the Nation’s new leadership has taken a different tack.

According to a BC Hydro information bulletin, in July 2015 the new Saulteau chief and councilors agreed to terms for a Site C impact benefits agreement. The agreement followed a controversial on-line vote by band members that saw 144 people cast ballots out of 711 eligible voters. Eighty-nine band members voted in favour of the agreement, which included lump sum payments, an annual payment stream and contracting opportunities. A logging company owned by a Saulteau band member was awarded the contract to clear the south banks of the Peace River, including the area around the historic fort.

Camper Yvonne Tupper, a Treaty 8 member from the Saulteau First Nation, says she does not recognize any of the nine different security guards and investigators she has encountered, all of them wearing “Saulteau Safety and Security” jackets. A second Saulteau woman at the Treaty 8 Stewards of the Land camp, who did not wish her name to be public, also said she did not recognize any of the security guards or investigators.

“When a single female is out here they ask more questions and they intimidate more and we have proof of that [because they are] being recorded,” says Tupper, a Chetwynd community health worker.” She says the campers film every interaction with security investigators and guards.

A company profile on the Work BC Employment Services Centre for Fort St. John describes Saulteau Safety and Security as a “partnership” between the Saulteau First Nations and the Vancouver-based company Securiguard Services Ltd. It says a joint venture agreement signed by the Saulteau chief and councilors provides “a significant opportunity to partner with the local first nations people and award them the right to protect their lands and represent their identity.” Securiguard is a Site C contractor, according to BC Hydro.

Huts airlifted into the encampment, which is four hours from Fort St. John by highway, backroad and snowmobile. Photo: Sarah Cox.

A December 11, 2015 job posting for Saulteau Safety and Security guards based in Fort St. John directs applicants to the Securiguard website. The job posting asks for candidates “who are able to effectively and positively communicate in a customer service oriented manner with a variety of people.” The jobs pay a starting wage of $16 to $19 an hour. Duties include welcoming people into the area, patrolling, crowd control, crime prevention and “providing excellent customer service.”

BC Hydro media relations spokesperson Dave Conway, responding to an emailed request for an interview with BC Hydro to discuss the Rocky Mountain Fort camp and Saulteau Safety and Security, emailed back what has become a scripted response about the camp which states that BC Hydro is “not moving equipment within the immediate proximity of individuals or the encampment itself.”

Conway did not respond to a second email with specific questions about Saulteau Safety and Security and the joint venture’s interactions with female campers.

Verena Hofmann, a Peace resident who is supporting Treaty 8 members at the camp, says she also feels intimidated by the security investigators and has told them so on camera. “This is repetitive,” she said on January 13 to two investigators from Saulteau Security who called themselves Glen and Sten, after they filmed her and asked the same questions for the second time in several hours. “To me that feels like pestering and harassment and it doesn’t feel like trying to find workable solutions as we’re hearing in the media quoted by BC Hydro.”

Signage at the encampment. Photo: Sarah Cox.

The area slated to be logged is the subject of an ongoing judicial review court case by the West Moberly and Prophet River First Nations, who say they were not adequately consulted regarding the permit process. These two First Nations have two additional court cases against Site C. Peace Valley landowners also have an appeal case against the dam that will be heard in early April.

A fifth on-going court case, launched by the Blueberry River First Nation, claims that the cumulative impact of Site C and other extensive industrial development in the Peace violates the band’s treaty rights.

Image: Yvonne Tupper points to trees cut on crown land that is the subject of the ongoing court case with the West Moberly and Prophet River First Nations. Photo: Sarah Cox.

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The B.C. government cannot expect support from First Nations for its much-touted liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects if the province insists on steamrolling ahead with the Site C dam, a First Nations chief is warning.

“They want support on LNG, and the level of destruction that is going to bring, and then they want Site C as well. They can’t have them both,” Chief Roland Willson of West Moberly First Nation told DeSmog Canada.

There is no logical reason to have both, Willson added, saying the provincial government has ignored alternatives to Site C, even as the federal Joint Review Panel found there is no immediate need for the power and excess power would be sold at a loss.

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Treaty 8 First Nations in B.C. are vehemently opposed to BC Hydro’s plans to build a third massive dam on the Peace River that would flood more than 5,000 hectares of land, swamp more than 330 recorded archaeological sites and — in direct contravention of the 1899 treaty — destroy land now used for hunting, fishing and collecting medicinal plants.

Initially, some Treaty 8 Tribal Association nations were willing to look at what the B.C. government was offering in terms of mitigation and compensation, but, as more information became available, Willson noted a change in attitude.

“Now everyone is opposed,” he said.

The treaty states First Nations have the right to continue with their way of life “for as long as the sun shines, the grass grows and the rivers flow.”

But with massive resource development in the area, the sun, grass and rivers are all at risk and Site C is the final straw, Willson said.

With high levels of methylmercury in fish because of rotting vegetation from the previous two dams, fishing is restricted and ungulates, such as caribou, are being destroyed by the major projects, said Treaty 8 Tribal Association Chief Liz Logan, who has asked the UN Special Rapporteur James Anaya to call on the government of British Columbia to assess cumulative impacts of industrial activity in the area.

A recent study, Passages from the Peace (PDF), by the David Suzuki Foundation and Global Forest Watch Canada found 28,587 kilometres of pipelines, 45,293 kilometres of roads and 116,725 kilometres of seismic lines used for oil and gas exploration within the Peace region.

“We have become the cash register for the province . . . .Now our way of life is going to be interfered with again,” Logan said.

“We are bush people and this is our grocery store, our pharmacy, our school and our church. It still sustains us.”

The treaty is alive, despite damage inflicted on the ecosystem by resource extraction and previous Peace River dams, so the province should think carefully about ramifications of treaty-breaking, Willson said.

The Joint Review Panel agreed the dam will have significant adverse effects on First Nations practices and heritage and that many of those effects cannot be mitigated.

A total of 21 First Nations would be affected if the valley is flooded and, with numerous legal decisions reasserting First Nations’ constitutional rights, there is growing awareness that a court challenge could hold up the $7.9 billion project for years if the province decides this fall to proceed.

First Nations file for judicial review of panel report

This month the Mikisew Cree First Nation, which has nine reserves in northeastern Alberta, and the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation, which has eight reserves near the southwestern tip of Lake Athabasca, filed a Federal Court application for a judicial review of the Joint Review Panel report.

The two Treaty 8 First Nations rely on the Peace Athabasca Delta for plant gathering, fishing, hunting and travel through the many lakes and river tributaries and presented evidence at the hearings that showed the Delta is already ecologically stressed, with low water levels affecting wildlife habitat and harvesting.

Any further changes to water levels in the Delta could prevent First Nations from exercising their treaty rights, according to the application, which aims to have some sections of the Joint Review Panel report declared invalid and unlawful, some sections quashed and others referred back to the panel for further consideration.

The application is asking the Federal Court to prohibit the federal and provincial governments from taking any further actions that would allow Site C to proceed until a new report is issued that complies with “principles of procedural fairness.”

BC Hydro spokesman Dave Conway said he could not speculate about the possibility of Site C heading to court.

“However, I can tell you that we aim to fulfill our duty to consult and, where appropriate, accommodate aboriginal groups,” he said.

Logan said the five Treaty 8 nations have not yet voted on whether to go to court, but there are heavy hints that any attempt to build the dam will immediately become entangled in legal battles.

Chief's mandate: 'Oppose this right to the end'

“The only mandate I have right now is to oppose this right to the end. We are going to go back to our people once we hear the decision,” Logan said.

Willson supports the judicial review of the environmental assessment and then, if necessary, a court challenge.

But going to court is expensive, especially when going up against the deep pockets of BC Hydro and the provincial government, he said.

BC Hydro has talked with more than 50 aboriginal groups in hundreds of meetings since 2007 and will continue to look for mitigation measures, Conway said.

“We are committed to providing lasting benefits to aboriginal groups through the construction and operation of the project. In addition, we are negotiating impact benefit agreements with some First Nations where appropriate,” he said.

An impact benefit agreement could mean a lump sum payment, payments over time, cash equivalent benefits or agreements around provincial Crown land, Conway said.

But a major hurdle is the distrust First Nations have for government.

West Moberley First Nation Chief Roland Willson. Credit: Garth Lenz.

“Nothing the B.C. government has done since I have been chief has made me trust that I can believe anything they do,” Willson said.

Logan said she always tries to be hopeful.

“But, unfortunately, in my 16 years of working with this government, I have learned not to really trust what comes out of their mouth,” she said.

Site C likely to get entangled in court challenges

As decision time approaches, other Site C opponents are counting on the power of First Nations.

There is no doubt Treaty 8 nations have a strong case for stopping the dam plans, said Andrea Morison, coordinator of the Peace Valley Environment Association.

“That bodes very well for the campaign and I absolutely expect it would go to court,” Morison said.

However, in the meantime, Peace Valley residents and First Nations are hoping Site C will be rejected and there will be no need for a legal battle.

That will take more pressure from people in southern B.C., Logan said. A petition to stop the Site C dam and save the Peace River Valley has been set up at StopSiteC.org

“We are doing everything we can, along with our environmental friends from down south, to create awareness and tell people ‘it’s coming out of your pocket,’ ” she said.

Photo: Treaty 8 Tribal Chief Liz Logan by Zack Embree.

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Major industrial power users in British Columbia fear that if the proposed Site C dam becomes a reality, rate hikes could put mills and mines out of business while saddling taxpayers with a costly white elephant and ballooning BC Hydro debt.

A decision on the $7.9 billion plan to build a third hydroelectric dam on the Peace River will be made by the federal and provincial governments this fall.

Economic questions about the mega-project were raised by last month’s joint review panel report, which noted the dam would likely be “the largest provincial public expenditure of the next 20 years.”

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The panel, which did not come out for or against the project, found that, based on cost comparisons provided by BC Hydro, Site C would be the most economical way to provide new power — but said it could not measure the true cost or need and recommended the B.C. Utilities Commission should look at it, an idea immediately dismissed by Energy Minister Bill Bennett. (The commission turned down the Site C project in the early ’80s.)

Strong opposition to Site C is now coming from the unlikely direction of the Association of Major Power Customers of B.C., an organization representing about 20 of the largest employers and industrial customers in the province.

“We have absolutely no confidence that this is the least cost plan,” association executive director Richard Stout told DeSmog Canada.

“It’s not the right project right now”

Major industrial power users in B.C. have seen a 50 per cent increase in rates over the last five years and are looking at another 50 per cent over the next five years, he said.

“It is unusual for us to criticize a government of this stripe, but BC Hydro has been out of control for a good 10 years,” Stout said, pointing to almost $5-billion in deferred accounts.

“Any other business would have been declared bankrupt by now,” he said.

Site C will take a decade to build and, with changing markets and a burgeoning natural gas industry causing a surplus of generating capacity in North America, it is almost impossible to accurately predict demand and prices, Stout said.

“All we know is the original load forecasts are going to be wrong,” he said. “It’s not the right project right now.”

Craig Thomson, energy and environment supervisor at Canfor Taylor pulp mill told DeSmog Canada that industry in B.C. was built with a foundation of low power rates, but in the last five years that has changed and Site C would be the final straw.

“I think the cost of hydro-electric dam construction is so astronomical that no one will ever do it again and we’re going to have this huge white elephant,” he said.

“Potentially it’s going to drive our industry out of business.”

B.C.’s natural gas hypocrisy

Doubts are growing about cost comparisons made by BC Hydro, which didn’t include the use of gas power because the 2010 Clean Energy Act demands that 93 per cent of the province’s energy needs be met by clean, renewable power.

The act effectively eliminated the use of gas turbines and sent the gas-fired Burrard Thermal generating station into early retirement.

But the province has now handed a Clean Energy Act exemption to the liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry, a move that allows gas plants to meet their massive power needs with natural gas. Meantime, BC Hydro is prevented from using natural gas even as a backup to renewables.

“It’s really hypocritical to allow them [LNG facilities] to burn gas,” Merran Smith at Clean Energy Canada told DeSmog Canada. “The carbon emissions, as well as the air pollution, are inconsistent with the province’s goals.”

“Gas is a fossil fuel. It may be cleaner than coal or oil, but it still has a heavy carbon footprint.”

Should gas turbines be allowed for backup power?

Like many others, Stout believes alternatives to Site C should be considered, including the use of gas turbines as an intermittent source of power — something that would first need the government to change the Clean Energy Act.

Thomson is looking at new technologies coming on stream and, in the meantime, Burrard Thermal, with a similar capacity to Site C, could provide sufficient intermittent power, he suggested.

“Electricity is 32 per cent of our operating cost and, if it goes up and up, someone is going to say the business is not viable and the doors will close,” he warned.

Energy economics expert Marvin Shaffer, adjunct professor at Simon Fraser University, believes Burrard Thermal should never have been eliminated as a source of backup energy.

“I’m not suggesting that an old, relatively inefficient plant like Burrard should be used as a base load facility. What Burrard can do is provide a very cost-effective backup to the hydro system as well as back-up peak capacity exactly where it might be required,” Shaffer said.

Burrard Thermal generating station was sent into early retirement with the introduction of the 2010 Clean Energy Act. Credit: Niall Williams via Flickr.

With Burrard in place, B.C. would have no shortfall of energy until 2033 and, even without Burrard, strategically placed gas thermal plants could supply low cost energy as needed, he said.

Faced with Site C as the alternative to intermittently using gas turbines, even Joe Foy of the Wilderness Committee comes down on the side of occasional gas use.

“It seems a better solution than drowning 100 kilometres of farmland when you don’t even need that power for 300 days of the year,” he said.

Oxford study: Dams routinely come in 90% over budget

Many also have concerns that, when costs such as transmission lines are factored in, Site C’s cost will soar above $7.9 billion.

Fears that costs will run amuck are backed by an Oxford University study of power dams that found construction costs of large dams are, on average, more than 90 per cent higher than their budgets.

Mark Winfield, associate professor in the environmental studies faculty at York University, sees parallels between Site C and costly nuclear power plant plans in Ontario.

“Large hydro projects like Site C and nuclear power plant construction or refurbishment reflect a focus on large, centralized, high-cost, high-risk, high-environmental impact, long-lived generating infrastructure,” he said.

That limits opportunities for the system to adapt to market changes and sets the focus on only one path, Winfield said.

“In both cases there are significant uncertainties about future demand and, therefore, substantial risk of making major investments in projects which may turn out not to be needed or which are overtaken by newer, better technologies,” he said.

Site C’s legacy: cheap power or wealth destruction?

Dan Potts, former executive director of the Association of Major Power Customers of B.C., believes the lasting legacy of Site C would be wealth destruction.

“The huge cost will rob the province of valuable resources that could be used to deliver other needed government services as well as burden the B.C. economy with debt and high electric power rates that will sap our competitiveness,” he said.

Times have changed from when previous dams were built on the Peace and Columbia Rivers, said Potts, who has calculated that gas prices would have to almost quadruple before power from Site C would be economically viable for export.

“B.C. Hydro has filed information that the cost of electric power from Site C will be in the range of $100 per megawatt hour. Current market prices are in the range of $30 per megawatt hour. If Site C were now operational, the market value of the power produced would be $350 million per year less than the cost,” Potts said.

Site C will lose $800 million in first four years: report

The possibility of exporting excess power to help fund the dam was discounted by the joint review panel, which predicted that, unless prices changed radically, B.C. Hydro operations would lose $800-million in the first four years of operations:

These losses would come home to B.C. ratepayers in one way or another. B.C. Hydro’s expectation is that it might sell Site C surpluses for only about one-third of costs, leaving B.C. ratepayers to pay for the rest.

But the panel also says that Site C, after an initial burst of expenditure, would lock in low rates for decades and produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions than other sources.

Ignoring the Clean Energy Act is not an option for BC Hydro and there is no doubt Site C compares favourably to other clean energy costs, said Hydro spokesman Dave Conway. In comparison to Site C power at $100 per megawatt hour, new generation from wind or micro-hydro comes in at $128 per megawatt hour, he said.

However, the panel noted that geothermal energy would cost about the same as Site C power — and as a firm source of power could present a viable alternative to the dam. Geothermal could be built incrementally to meet demand, eliminating the early-year losses of Site C, the panel noted.

Even without Site C, customers are looking at a 28 per cent increase in rates over the next five years, but British Columbians should bear in mind that they are paying one of the four lowest energy rates in North America, Conway said.

However, Foy would like all British Columbians to consider what else could be done with almost $8-billion.

“Maybe better education for kids or health care?” he asked.

“If we spend $8-billion on Site C, what community doesn’t get a health care facility?”

Image Credit: An area of the Peace River Valley threatened by Site C. Photo by tuchodi via Flickr.

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Every day British Columbians flick on light switches, power up their computers and cook dinner, confidently expecting the power supply will not fail them.

The expectation that reliable electric power will be available is emphasized by BC Hydro as it touts benefits of the proposed Site C dam on the Peace River and the resulting “clean” energy that could theoretically power 450,000 homes each year.

“Our forecasts show the demand for electricity will increase by approximately 40 per cent during the next 20 years,” said Charles Reid, BC Hydro president.

“And an emerging liquefied natural gas sector could further increase the demand for electricity.”

But, looking into the future is an unreliable art and, while BC Hydro insists that the power will be needed by the time the $8-billion project is completed in 2024, opponents say that, especially at a time when the energy market is undergoing rapid change, the mega-dam will end up as a costly white elephant.

The unknowns include changes in demand because of economic development, the cost of electricity, public policy changes and development of alternative energy sources.

Need for Site C dam not proven: joint review panel

The joint review panel assessing the Site C dam concluded that, although there will be an increasing need for power in the future and Site C is likely to be the most cost-effective option, BC Hydro failed to prove that the new energy would be needed within the timeframe set out in the proposal. [view:in_this_series=block_1]

“The panel concludes that the proponent has not fully demonstrated the need for the projects on the timetable set forth,” says the report submitted this month to the federal and provincial governments.

The panel makes it clear that federal and provincial government decision-makers need to be sure the power is needed before giving the go-ahead.

Justification for Site C “must rest on an unambiguous need for the power and analysis showing its financial costs being sufficiently attractive as to make tolerable the bearing of substantial social and other costs,” the report says.

The findings have sparked more questions about the need for Site C power, especially as annual figures show B.C. is usually a net exporter of energy

“This opens the door for us to have conversations about alternatives – local projects with benefits for local people – projects like smaller hydro, wind, natural gas and even geothermal,” said Treaty 8 Tribal Chief Liz Logan.

LNG argument has cracks

Even the LNG argument — used by Premier Christy Clark in last year’s election campaign as a major reason for building Site C — is losing traction as most companies indicate that, for compression and liquefaction of the gas (which takes vast amounts of electricity), they will generate their own power by burning natural gas already flowing through their pipes.

In order to burn natural gas, the LNG industry has been handed a blanket exemption from the Clean Energy Act, raising concerns about the government’s commitment to cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

The Pembina Institute estimates that if five LNG facilities are built, the industry would more than double B.C.’s carbon pollution, single-handedly emitting nearly three-quarters as many greenhouse gases as Alberta’s oilsands.

However, even those who argue that LNG plants should be powered using renewable electricity, don’t necessarily point to a need for the Site C dam. Clean Energy Canada, for instance, argues that the LNG industry can power itself on regionally produced clean electricity, mostly wind power on B.C.’s north coast.

Even under that scenario, LNG plants will need power from BC Hydro for ancillary needs, such as running the site, said Dave Conway, BC Hydro spokesman.

Initial estimates said increased capacity would be needed by 2027/28, but, with taking LNG plans into account, even a “low LNG load forecast” moves the need for energy up to 2024.

“Mining is also one of the big drivers so, with or without LNG, new capacity and new power is needed by 2024,” Conway told DeSmog Canada.

In B.C., about one-third of electricity is used by residential customers, another third is used by commercial customers and another third goes to industrial customers, he said.

“The need for this project comes from growing demand,” Conway said. “Economic development is the primary driver.”

BC Hydro overestimates demand for power: retired federal economist

That need continues despite residential customers reducing power use because of conservation and BC Hydro’s own documents showing it plans to meet 70 per cent of future demand growth through conservation. It is essential that BC Hydro is able to meet peak load requirements, Conway said, even though peak demand may come only one day a year.

However, retired federal economist Erik Andersen said BC Hydro has a chronic problem with over-estimating the demand for power.

“Over the course of the past four decades, the need for a Site C generation facility has been part of the larger and exaggerated demand narrative BC Hydro has been telling,” he told DeSmog Canada..

Andersen crunched the numbers and is questioning Hydro’s estimates of a population growth of one million people in the next 20 years, which he says doesn’t fit with B.C Statistics forecasts.

“There has been one heck of a rollback in population growth, but BC Hydro seems to want to ignore that,” he said.

Future demand analysis based on "serious market failure"

Energy economics expert Marvin Shaffer, adjunct professor in the school of public policy at Simon Fraser University, said BC Hydro’s analysis of future demand is based on a “very serious market failure” in the pricing of electricity.

“The only reason Site C is ‘needed’ is because the government is preventing BC Hydro from using gas-fired thermal units to back up its hydro system when needed,” he told DeSmog Canada.

“If the project is built as planned, it will be surplus to forecast requirements for many years and sold in the export spot market at a significant financial loss.”

Even if some power was sold to LNG plants, which would otherwise use gas-fired thermal power to meet their energy needs, it wouldn’t be at a price that would begin to recover Site C’s full cost, Shaffer said.

It is unlikely that surplus power could be exported because energy produced at Site C would be too expensive, agreed NDP opposition leader John Horgan.

“With the advent of shale gas everywhere in North America, the price of electricity has plummeted because people can get gas and turn it into electricity at a relatively low price,” he told DeSmog Canada.

Is the era of building big dams over?

Government will decide this fall whether to proceed with Site C, but Energy Minister Bill Bennett already seems convinced of the need for more power.

“We don’t need the electricity today or tomorrow or the next year, but we are pretty darn sure we are going to need it 10 years from now,” he told reporters after the release of the joint review panel report.

However, Paul Kariya, executive director of Clean Energy BC — an industry trade association that represents independent power producers, including gas generators —told DeSmog Canada that predicting power demand is a “mug’s game” and there is a way to meet power needs incrementally.

“Times have changed. We’ve been through an era of building big dams,” Kariya said. “When you build a dam, you get this one massive lump of power and that’s not the way that energy is planned for anymore. What we offer is a more incremental approach.”

Up next: Part 3 of our Site C series will explore the alternatives to building the Site C dam.

Photo: "LNG Canada joint venture agreement signing" by Province of British Columbia

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