BC Hydro’s new CEO Chris O’Riley has written a letter to the B.C. Utilities Commission stating that the crown corporation will not meet the timeline for river diversion for the Site C dam, which will add $610 million to the project’s price tag.

“BC Hydro has encountered some geotechnical and construction challenges on the project and the risk to the river diversion timeline has now materialized,” O’Riley wrote.

“Based on the recent completion of a constructability review and an executive meeting with our Main Civil Works contractor on September 27, 2017, we have now determined that we will not be able to meet the current timeline for river diversion in 2019.”

The letter was in response to questions set out in the BCUC’s preliminary report issued on Sept. 20th.

ICYMI: What That 205-Page BCUC Report on the Site C Dam Actually Said

“Not meeting the current river diversion timeline has created new pressures on the project’s budget. We estimate that this development in the project is expected to increase its cost by 7.3 per cent or $610 million, for a total forecast project cost of $8.945 billion,” reads the letter.

BC Hydro had identified risks to the river diversion timeline in its August 30 filing with the B.C. Utilities Commission. An independent audit by Deloitte also identified the risk.

"BC Hydro are finally being a bit more transparent. It’s what we had expected for some time that this project has been mismanaged," said former BC Hydro CEO Marc Eliesen.

BREAKING: Site C Dam $600 Million Over Budget, Will Miss River Diversion Timeline, Says BC Hydro CEO https://t.co/ExEm9pgmu6 #SiteC #bcpoli

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) October 5, 2017

The Site C dam is the most expensive public project in B.C. history and, if completed, will flood more than 100 kilometres of river valley, destroying farmland and First Nations spiritual sites.

“Today’s filing provides an opportunity for us to share new information with the commission and the public,” O’Riley wrote in his letter. “Like all large, complex projects, Site C faces risks and uncertainties.”

The letter also notes that while the delay will set some activities back a year, there was a one-year float built into the schedule and BC Hydro is “confident we can still deliver this project ton time by November 2024.”

But Eliesen says that’s not a credible claim.

“There’s no way they’re going to meet the 2024 deadline. Keep in mind we’ve only completed two years of a nine-year project. We’ve got seven years to go with all of the problems and challenges and geo-technical issues,” Eliesen told DeSmog Canada.

The BC Hydro letter also notes that “due to the project’s complexity, we expect to continue to face risks in other areas, including our second largest procurement (i.e. the Generating Station and Spillway) that remains open and the highway realignment.”

Eliesen estimates the final price tag on Site C will escalate to $12 billion if the project is not terminated.

ICYMI: Revealed: Inside the B.C. Government's Site C Spin Machine

ICYMI: EXCLUSIVE: B.C. Government Broke Law to Expedite Site C Dam Construction, Legal Experts Say

“It is following almost the identical track that the other two major hydro projects in Canada — Keeyask in Manitoba and Muskrat Falls — have followed.”

Those two projects have been struck by major cost overruns and delays.

Despite the challenges Site C is facing, the letter states that BC Hydro’s analysis “continues to confirm that completing Site C as planned is still the most cost-effective option for our customers.”

“We remain committed to Site C and are confident in our ability to deliver the project,” the letter reads.

Eliesen finds that conclusion “totally bizarre” and credits the “very good work” of the Deloitte consultants for forcing BC Hydro to admit the project is over budget and behind schedule.

“To try to complete this project at this time is throwing good money at bad,” he said. “All of the evidence that’s coming out from this inquiry is that we don’t need the power.”

DeSmog Canada first reported on June 30, 2016, that the Site C dam was behind schedule and over budget. Documents obtained via Freedom of Information legislation later revealed a co-ordinated attempt by BC Hydro and the Premier's Office to discredit the story.

Image: Site C dam construction June 2016. Photo: Garth Lenz|DeSmog Canada

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The 2014 financial reports from B.C.’s political parties are out and my face hurts from all of the eyebrow raising.

Donations to political parties from corporations are banned federally, but here in B.C. — the wild west of political donations — the corporate cash is free-flowing.

Here are the Top 5 disconcerting revelations from this year’s disclosures. (Thanks to Integrity BC for drawing my attention to many of these.)

1) Let’s start with the $40,950 that accounting firm KPMG gave to the BC Liberals in 2014. KPMG is the company BC Hydro hired to “independently review” the costs of the $8.8 billion Site C dam. The B.C. government has pointed to the KPMG report to defend its decision to ignore an expert recommendation to send the project to the B.C. Utilities Commission for review.

Since 2005, KPMG and its related companies have given $284,994 to the BC Liberals and $13,150 to the NDP.

2) In the words of IntegrityBC’s Dermod Travis “the 2014 Award for Incredibly Bad Taste in Donations goes to Imperial Metals, owners of the Mount Polley mine.”

The mining company donated $7,150 to the Liberals, including a $1,500 cheque in October and another for $250 in November, in the months following the company’s enormous Mount Polley tailings dam failure.

“The spill may have been toxic, but Imperial's cash wasn't,” Travis quipped.

3) Oil and gas transportation companies got in on the action, too, with Kinder Morgan ($4,500), TransCanada Pipelines ($5,600), Coastal GasLink Pipeline ($12,500) and Enbridge Northern Gateway ($13,450) all filling up the Liberal’s bank account.

Woodfibre LNG, which is proposing a liquefied natural gas export terminal in Howe Sound, gave $28,000 to the Liberals and $8,000 to the B.C. NDP. Woodfibre also spent more than $18,000 on newspaper and radio ads in Squamish during the November 2014 local election.

4) As the high-stakes Metro Vancouver waste debate raged on last year, BFI Canada gave the Liberals $91,300 and Belkorp Environmental Services gave $37,200.

Those companies didn’t like Metro Vancouver’s garbage plans, so they also hired lobbyists to pressure the provincial government. According to B.C.’s Office of the Registrar of Lobbyists, Belkorp hired John Les, former MLA for Chilliwack, and BFI hired lobbyist Dimitri Pantazopoulos, who was the Liberals’ chief pollster during the 2013 provincial election.

5) Perhaps the most bizarre donation of all is one for $28,750 from the Alberta Newspaper Group to the Liberals.

Alberta Newspaper Group has no papers in B.C., but is run and partially owned by British Columbian David Radler. Yes, that David Radler. The one who went to jail, along with his business partner Conrad Black, after being convicted of defrauding their company Hollinger Inc.

Alberta Newspaper Group is a subsidiary of Glacier Media, which owns the Victoria Times Colonist. Radler was named the acting publisher of the Victoria Times Colonist a year ago.

Radler also runs Continental Newspapers, which publishes the Kelowna Daily Courier and Penticton Herald.

As traditional media players face unprecedented hardships to stay alive, it’s a wonder how any newspaper company can afford to scrounge up tens of thousands of dollars to curry political favour.

Sadly, this is far from the first time a B.C. media company has donated to a political party. In 2013, Postmedia — which owns the Vancouver Sun and The Province — donated $10,000 to the BC Liberals. In 2009, Glacier Media gave $100,000 to the Liberals. And between 2006 and 2011, Black Press — which owns more than 70 community newspapers in B.C.— contributed $5,430 to the BC Liberals.

It’s exactly the kind of impropriety that would typically set the press off on a feeding frenzy — alas, the only organizations to escape the news media’s often savage scrutiny are the news media themselves.

Photo: Mary Crandall via Flickr

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