Calls for an independent safety review of the Site C dam project are mounting following a large landslide near the project’s worksite that has blocked the only road to a small community and led to the evacuation of residents by boat.

Retired BC Hydro engineer Vern Ruskin said this week’s mushrooming slide is a reminder that the project is located in an area prone to landslides and that a major landslide close to the Site C dam structure could compromise it.

“If the landslide is a long way off and all they get is a wave then the dam can withstand it,” Ruskin told The Narwhal. “If the landslide is close enough it could damage the dam structure and it may fail.”

Ruskin, who directed the team that designed the five dams originally planned for the Peace River, including Site C, said he has repeatedly asked the B.C. government and BC Hydro to conduct an independent safety review of the project due to its location in a valley with a history of large landslides and because of a change to the design of the dam structure.

When former B.C. premier Gordon Campbell announced his government would proceed with the Site C project in 2010, the dam structure was depicted as a very slight arc. But in 2014 an L-shaped structure — which Ruskin says to the best of his knowledge has never been used anywhere in the world for an earthen dam — was revealed when former premier Christy Clark announced final approval of the project.

The new structure is described by one engineering firm that helped design it as “unique” and an “innovative solution” to stabilize the original river valley wall.

Ruskin said that is all the more reason for an independent safety review of the $10.7 billion dam, the largest publicly funded infrastructure project in B.C.’s history.

“Someone outside of BC Hydro has to do the review,” said Ruskin, who taught engineering economics at UBC for 14 years. “It seems to me that if you are going to do something completely different you should test it.”

Dam safety under fire around world

Announced in 2010 as a $6.6 billion project and given final government approval in 2014 as an $8.8 billion project, the Site C dam’s price tag climbed by an additional $2 billion late last year.

Dam safety practice around the world “has been shaken” by the recent collapse of tailings pond dams at B.C.’s Mount Polley mine and in Brazil, the Site C project’s technical advisory board noted in its February meeting minutes. The board, charged with providing technical reviews and engineering advice, also noted the 2017 failure of California’s Oroville dam spillways following heavy rains, which led to the evacuation of more than 180,000 people downstream.

“Considerable re-evaluation of site documentation to better inform future dam safety assessment is currently underway in the industry,” the board noted in its minutes. The board also said it was “of the view” that the Site C project should “engage in these evaluations to be able to assert that it is adopting Best Available Practices.”

The minutes were disclosed in affidavits filed for a First Nations court case seeking an injunction to stop work on the Site C project until a treaty rights legal case is resolved.

The Narwhal had previously requested technical advisory board meeting minutes through a Freedom of Information request, but the response was so heavily redacted it was impossible to determine if the board had any dam safety concerns.

In a statement e-mailed to The Narwhal, the B.C. energy ministry said BC Hydro has conducted extensive engineering studies into the geology of the Site C project area — including the dam site — for decades.

“The issue of historical slides in the area is well documented and its being addressed by BC Hydro with the excavations and stabilization measures that have been taking place at site since construction started in 2015,” said the statement.

The Peace valley landslide, which began overnight on Saturday, has left engineers scrambling to survey the unstable slope close to one entrance to the dam worksite, which is not affected.

Landslide near dam site forces evacuation orders

The landslide, which continues to gather momentum, has displaced five million cubic metres of earth — almost half the amount BC Hydro has excavated from the river’s north bank over the past three years to prepare for building the Site C project’s river diversion tunnels and the dam structure.

On Tuesday the Peace River Regional District — which has issued evacuation orders for three properties — evacuated people by boat who opted to leave their homes in Old Fort, a community of about 50 residences that has been isolated by the slide.

BC Hydro spokesperson Mora Scott said in an e-mail to The Narwhal that “there is no evidence to suggest that the slide that took place over the weekend is related to Site C or any of the work taking place on the project.”

The slide occurred immediately below a former gravel pit operation, where piles of stockpiled construction materials were clearly visible.

According to Peace River Regional District documents, when the gravel pit operation closed down in 2015, the B.C. ministry of energy and mines advised the owner that any future mining activities at the site would require a mine plan developed by a qualified professional, due to “past geotechnical and slope stability issues.”

“We all know the slopes are very unstable in the valley,” said Ken Boon, president of the Peace Valley Landowner Association, representing 70 landowners who will be impacted by the Site C dam. “An independent review of the Site C safety issues would be prudent.”

Arthur Hadland, the former Peace River Regional District director for the area that includes Old Fort, has repeatedly asked successive provincial governments to establish an independent panel of academic and non-academic geological experts to investigate the safety of residents of Old Fort, Taylor and Alberta, downstream from the Site C dam.

Hadland said in an interview that his concerns were heightened following BC Hydro’s confirmation in August that the Site C dam will be anchored to shale bedrock instead of to firmer bedrock such as granite.

“Shale is old mud,” said Hadland. “It’s 80,000 year-old mud. When it’s exposed to air and a little bit of moisture it turns back to mud.”

In August, BC Hydro spokesperson Dave Conway told local media that the Crown corporation has not been searching for stronger bedrock at the dam site, where it has removed 11 million cubic metres of earth in an effort to resolve geotechnical issues that have added to the project’s escalating cost.

“We know what rock is here,” Conway said.

“The dam is going to rest on shales, and the powerhouse and spillway structures are going to be anchored into shale materials as well.”

Ruskin said it’s not uncommon to build dams on shale, even though it is weaker than other types of bedrock. But what concerns him is the combination of shale and the new L-shaped design structure that includes construction of a roller compacted concrete buttress that will serve as the foundation for the generating station and spillways.

“That has never been done before,” he said. “They are pioneering.”

“There’s nothing wrong with a new idea,” Ruskin said, as long as the new design passes a safety review by a committee independent of BC Hydro and its contractors. Such a committee should include representation from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which operates and maintains 700 dams, because it has extensive experience building on shale, he said.

Slope instability identified as issue during environmental review

The Joint Review Panel that examined the Site C project for the federal and provincial governments noted that slope instability and landslides in the valley “would potentially adversely affect” the project and “could result in landslide-generated waves or overtopping of the dam that could result in direct damage to infrastructure.”

In its most recent quarterly Site C report, made public in late September, BC Hydro referred to a June rockslide near construction of one of two river diversion tunnels as a “minor geotechnical event,” noting that remediation work is underway to minimize schedule impacts.

BC Hydro also stated in the same report that “changes to geotechnical ground conditions remain a risk to the project schedule and cost.”

The energy ministry said BC Hydro has identified 16 other earthen dams around the world that rest on a similar shale foundation. There are 57,000 large dams in the world, according to the U.S. non-profit group International Rivers.

The valley where the Site C reservoir would sit has experienced huge landslides in the past.

In 1973, a landslide in the future Site C reservoir area hurled 14.7 million cubic metres of debris a distance of almost one kilometre, damming the Peace River for 12 hours and generating a wave so high it snapped trees more than 20 metres above the river.

Sixteen years later, a slide at the nearby Halfway River, which would be flooded by Site C, sent 3.6 million cubic metres of debris into the Peace, blocking it for six hours and sending the river north.

And in 2016, a series of landslides at Lynx Creek, a Peace River tributary that would also be inundated by Site C, sent a plume of toxic metals, including arsenic, barium, cadmium, lithium and lead, into the Peace River.

According to BC Hydro technical reports, engineers expect as many as 4,000 landslides will be triggered by the Site C reservoir, which will be up to 50 metres deep, several kilometres wide and stretch for a total 128 kilometres along the Peace River and its tributaries — about the same distance as driving from Vancouver to Whistler.

Many of the landslides will be small, but some will be so large they are expected to generate waves reaching so far above the reservoir they may damage a planned new bridge across the Halfway River, according to BC Hydro reports.

BC Hydro says the Site C project is designed “to the highest recommendations” of the Canadian Dam Association, to withstand major events such as earthquakes and floods, and that the project design is in keeping with international best practice.

* The article has been updated from an earlier version that stated the landslide began following intense rain. In fact, there was no rain the night of the landslide.

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In the heart of one of the continent’s biggest fracking booms stands a place the people of the Doig River First Nation have revered for generations.

Elders remember visiting this ancient spruce forest in northeastern B.C. as children on horseback. There they’d hunt moose, grieve their loved ones, heal their spirits.

So as oil and gas wells began to crop up all over their traditional territory, the elders of Doig River decided to do something to protect their most sacred place.

In 2011, they declared a tribal park called K’ih tsaa?dze, which means “old spruce” in the Dane-za, or Beaver, language.

Located about 40 kilometres northeast of Fort St. John, the 90,000-hectare tract of land crosses the B.C.-Alberta border and contains old-growth spruce forest and wetlands, crucial habitat for caribou and grizzly bear. “It’s the last place we have for our people,” former chief Norman Davis told me one morning last summer in the Doig River community centre (in December, the community elected a new chief, who is also supportive of the tribal park.)

Tea and coffee were brewing as elders sat around chatting and watching TV. The CBC was reporting on the Petronas LNG debate in the B.C. legislature — the impacts of which will be felt directly here in natural gas-rich northeastern B.C.

Doig River First Nation, home to 300 people, just so happens to sit atop the Montney Shale, which contains reserves of 449 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and more than one million barrels of oil.

As a result, the nation has 8,500 oil and gas wells in its backyard on the B.C. side of the border alone. Many of those wells use hydraulic fracturing or “fracking,” which involves sending a high-pressure combination of water and chemicals underground to break apart the rock and release the oil or gas.

It’s a foreign process to people who were born on this land — people like band councillor Gerry Attachie who remembers seeing surveyors marking out the border between B.C. and Alberta in K’ih tsaa?dze.

“We’ve been there forever, even before they made the Alberta-B.C. border,” he told me. “We use it for healing. Spiritual healing. We get healed out there and we pray.”

The Doig River Medical Centre is adjacent to the community centre, where community members gather for tea and coffee and for meetings.

‘Before the White People Destroyed Our Land’

I piled into a truck with three elders — brothers Tommy and Billy Attachie and Sam Acko — and headed out to see K’ih tsaa?dze with my own two eyes.

Sam drove while I asked questions about the elders’ memories on this land. Often the men broke into conversation in their mother tongue, Beaver.

Tommy, sporting an “old guys rule” hat, is 73. Billy, 75, needed crutches. He remembers his first visit to K’ih tsaa?dze at seven years old.

“I was riding behind my grandma on her saddle horse,” he said. “It was a day-long trip on a horse. We’d take a dog team in the winter. We would make a trip of it and camp at various places along the way. That was before the white people destroyed our land with roads and well sites.”

Fireweed blooms along the road leading to K’ih tsaa?dze Tribal Park. A gas plant is located no more than 100 metres away.

We bumped down a gravel road lined with willows and spruce. Industry signs marking oil and gas access roads flew by on the side of the road.

As we arrived at the first K’ih tsaa?dze sign, a gas plant hummed in the background no more than 100 metres away.

By the time we passed an oil pumpjack, Tommy and Billy had been lulled to sleep.

A sign for K’ih tsaa?dze Tribal Park on the B.C. side of the border states that the land is used to hunt, trap, camp and share cultural teachings.

‘It’s Like Your Spirit is Renewed’

Sam and I continued talking as he drove.

“After you leave K’ih tsaa?dze it’s like your spirit is renewed,” Sam said.

He told me about continuing to use the land as a bush school and reminisced about using K’ih tsaa?dze as a hunting camp in the early ’70s and drying moose there.

“Telling these stories always makes me hungry,” he said with a laugh.

Sam Acko remembers using K’ih tsaa?dze as a hunting camp in the early ’70s. He says: “After you leave K’ih tsaa?dze it’s like your spirit is renewed.”

Thankfully, we had a picnic packed and soon arrived to an old-growth grove of spruce trees that has miraculously withstood multiple forest fires.

“There is something that we don’t know that protects this area,” Sam said.

With the smell of sap thick in the air we sat down on wooden benches for lunch. The mosquitoes were so fierce they bit right through my jeans.

Sam talked about tuberculosis and smallpox wiping out his relatives. “We didn’t have a word for cancer then,” he lamented.

This old-growth spruce forest has never been burned by a forest fire, according to elders who say it seems to be protected by a special force.

Protecting a Sacred Place

This is the place the people of Doig River come when they’ve lost someone in their community — for its peace and quiet.

However, keeping this place quiet has proven to be quite a challenge.

In 2013, the Province of Alberta wrote to Doig River First Nation, ordering them to remove their signs for the tribal park on the Alberta side of the border. When they didn’t do so, the government removed the signs themselves.

The letter from the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Resource Development stated: “K’ih tsaa?dze Tribal Park does not meet the criteria for the establishment of a conservation area in Alberta.”

Alberta Request to Remove KTP Sign

That was under the previous Progressive Conservative government. Since the NDP took power, discussions have begun about the tribal park, says Jane Calvert, land and resource manager for Doig River First Nation.

The nation is also in ongoing negotiations with the B.C. government about protection mechanisms. This isn’t the first time the B.C. government has been brought to the table to discuss an indigenous conserved area.

Take Duu Guusd Tribal Park, established by the Council of the Haida Nation in 1981. Although not initially seen as a formal park, the area was eventually recognized by the provincial government as a heritage site and conservancy.

Meares Island Tribal Park, meantime, was declared by the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation in 1984, but has never been given any provincial or federal recognition. Despite that, an injunction to stop logging on that island has stood for 30 years.

In 2014, the Tsilhqot’in Nation declared Dasiqox Tribal Park as a way to proactively assert itself on its territory. (Read DeSmog Canada’s feature on Dasiqox: ‘It’s  No Longer About Saying No’: How First Nations Are Taking Charge With Tribal Parks).

K’ih tsaa?dze is unique in that it’s on treaty territory.

“Some tenure sales have been reverted back to the crown, which is tremendously good news,” Calvert said.

The Legal Standing of Tribal Parks

Jack Woodward, aboriginal law expert and lawyer in the landmark Tsilhqot’in title case, told DeSmog Canada that declaring a tribal park is a way of putting government and industry on notice that this is the minimum territory required to continue exercising aboriginal or treaty rights — rights that are ultimately constitutionally protected.

“So you might want to call a tribal park a constitutional park, because it’s a park that can not be violated under our current constitution,” Woodward said.

“The word ‘park’ means two quite different things,” Woodward continued. “In the regular federal and provincial sense, it means something about locking it up and keeping human beings out, whereas in a tribal park it means something closer to a sustainable ongoing use.”

In the case of a treaty right to hunt moose, for instance, those moose need a relatively intact place to live.

“Really what this comes down to is protection of habitat,” Woodward said. “You declare a tribal park and what you’re saying is: ‘Cross this line and we’re going to get an injunction to stop you from doing the industrial activity anyway.’ ”

The Doig River First Nation’s ability to hunt moose has been severely impacted.

“We’ve done some recent research on moose and what we found is that in the lifetime of our elders, the community harvest for moose has been reduced by 75 per cent,” Calvert said. “It’s not because they don’t like moose or they want to go to the grocery store. It’s because moose is disappearing from the landscape, just like caribou.”

The High Cost of Fighting Industry

Since declaring the park, industry has mostly stopped submitting development applications, Calvert said.

That in and of itself is a victory.

Dealing with one seismic application, for instance, can cost the nation between $40,000 and $60,000.

However, the alternative isn’t cheap either. Doig River First Nation has had to fund all of the scientific work, including water and soil contaminant samples and an ecosystem-based management plan, for the tribal park.

“It’s been costly, but so is trying to fend off applications for oil and gas work,” Calvert said. “It’s more cost effective to do it proactively.”

Since the declaration in 2011, there has been no new development in K’ih tsaa?dze on the B.C. side of the border, although existing development was allowed to run its course.

“They know we are really serious about protecting this area,” Calvert said.

The declaration is an indicator of a resurgence of First Nations power, said Faisal Moola, director general for David Suzuki Foundation, which has provided research support for the park.

“This will become very iconic in B.C. as First Nations begin to move from opposition to large-scale industrial development or trophy hunting to articulating an ambition of how the land can be used differently under their own governance,” Moola said.

“This is really about First Nations re-asserting their governance over the land.”

Recently, Calvert attended a gathering in Tofino of indigenous leaders from around the world involved in creating indigenous conserved areas.

“I had this sense that I was part of something very, very important — that we’re making history,” she said. “Sometimes you’re living in the moment and you don’t realize how important it is until years later. We’ll be looking back on this thinking we were part of a very important movement.”

This is part 2 of a series. Read part 1 on Dasiqox Tribal Park.

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In an exclusive interview with DeSmog Canada, former BC Hydro CEO Marc Eliesen says ratepayers will face a “devastating” increase in their electricity bills if the Site C dam is built and emphasizes there is no rush to build new sources of power generation in B.C.

“With Site C, BC Hydro ratepayers will be facing a devastating increase of anywhere between 30 and 40 per cent over the next three years,” Eliesen told DeSmog Canada in his first interview on the subject.

“There’s no rush. There’s no immediate need for Site C or any other alternative energy,” he said.

Eliesen’s comment about the lack of immediate need for the power echoes statements made by Harry Swain, the chair of the panel that reviewed the Site C hydro dam for the provincial and federal governments. In March, Swain told DeSmog Canada the B.C. government should have held off on making a decision on the dam.

With a price tag of $8.8 billion, the 1,100-megawatt Site C dam is the most expensive public project in B.C. history. The hydro dam, which would impact 13,000 hectares of agricultural land, has been proposed for the Peace River for three decades.

In late 2014, the provincial and federal governments approved the project and this July construction permits were issued despite pending court challenges by First Nations.

Eliesen, an economist by training, has also served as chairman and CEO of Ontario Hydro, chairman of Manitoba Hydro and has held senior roles with the federal government and the governments of Ontario and Manitoba. In November, Eliesen called the National Energy Board’s review process for the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline “fraudulent” and a “public deception” as he dropped out of the process.

Failure to Consider Columbia River Power ‘Non-Sensical’

Eliesen said there is no rush to build new generating capacity in B.C., leaving “more than sufficient time to evaluate alternatives” that are more cost effective and minimize environmental impacts.

The alternatives include everything from geothermal to BC Hydro’s Burrard Thermal plant — due to be decommissioned in 2016 — to the 1,100 megawatts of electricity B.C. has access to through the Columbia River Treaty, Eliesen said.

Not considering using the Columbia River power to meet B.C.’s needs is “non-sensical,” Eliesen said.  (See: The Forgotten Electricity that Could Eliminate Need for Site C Dam)

“If there is a demand for the power, well you clearly have an available supply, which you can depend on,” he said.

“If there was some massive escalation in demand that you needed immediately, well my goodness, you’ve got two instant sources: there’s 1,100 megawatts from the Columbia River and almost another 1,000 from the Burrard Thermal Plant, which was converted from coal to natural gas some time ago.”

Mining, LNG Companies Not Paying ‘Fair Share’

Eliesen also critiqued BC Hydro for adopting a price structure that results in everyday British Columbians subsidizing heavy power users.

“Whether it’s mining or proposed LNG plants or anything of that nature …  They’re all subsidized by other hydro ratepayers. Those heavy power users do not pay the true cost,” Eliesen said. “They are not paying their fair share.”

The B.C. Utilities Commission used to review the cost of service, but that doesn’t take place any more, Eliesen said.

“The provincial government basically declared we don’t want the commission — we don’t want anyone — looking at BC Hydro plans. I think the result has been quite devastating.”

The B.C. government exempted the Site C dam from a review by the B.C. Utilities Commission, despite calls from its own expert panel to refer the project for an independent review of costs and need. The province’s failure to consider the panel’s recommendations has since become the basis for the Peace Valley Landowners Association court challenge against the Site C dam.

Eliesen noted other jurisdictions are conducting much more thorough analyses of hydro projects, noting two projects in Manitoba he recently advised on. 

“They went through the most detailed evaluation by the Manitoba Public Utilities Board that ever could have taken place,” Eliesen said. “The kind of analysis and investigation and due diligence that was taken has never taken place recently in British Columbia.”

Site C Dam Price Tag Likely to Escalate

In 1993, when Eliesen was the president and CEO of BC Hydro, he issued a public statement on behalf of the board stating that Site C would never be built because of its significant negative environmental, economic and social impacts.

That position quietly went by the wayside when the Gordon Campbell government was elected, Eliesen said, noting that electricity costs have increased at a far quicker rates than other jurisdictions since then.

Over the years, Eliesen has seen the cost of the Site C dam nearly double. 

“I’ve seen the costs of Site C escalate enormously,” he says. “It used to be $5, $6 billion, then it was $7.9, now it’s $8.8 billion. It’ll easily reach, if it’s ever built, in the $11 to $12 billion dollar range.”

Eliesen says the costs of Site C haven’t been adequately reviewed and there are “too many conflicting interests in BC Hydro for it to undertake its own due diligence on this matter.”

Calls for a moratorium on construction on Site C have gained strength recently with the Greater Vancouver Regional District and Peace River Regional District both calling on Premier Christy Clark to pause the project while active court cases are completed

On July 23, the B.C. Government and Service Employees’ Union announced its opposition to the Site C dam due to its violation of indigenous rights and the massive loss of habitat and agricultural lands.

Site C Dam ‘Doesn’t Make Any Sense’

Despite the growing calls for a moratorium, the B.C. government appears hell-bent on pushing ahead with building the dam.

Asked why the government continues to push ahead, Eliesen said it doesn’t make any sense.

“Well I can’t talk for the government, so I don’t know, other than they want some major project undertaken during their current election term,” he said.

“It doesn’t make sense in the context of environment, it doesn’t make sense in the context of wanting to work with First Nations and it doesn’t make sense, more specifically, on the economic impact because the B.C. ratepayer will pay enormously over the next three years.”

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On the banks of the Peace River on Saturday, Grand Chief Stewart Phillip told hundreds of opponents to the Site C dam that he will be handcuffed if necessary to stop BC Hydro’s mega project from moving ahead. 

“From this point forward we have to really focus our efforts on how we’re going to physically stop this project from happening,” Phillip said during a speech at the 10th annual Paddle for the Peace. “The provincial cabinet recently approved permits to allow construction to begin. That’s where the rubber is going to hit the road.”

An emotional Phillip said B.C. is on the eve of an uprising after the government has repeatedly dealt in “bad faith” with First Nations.

Grand Chief Stewart Phillip has vowed to be arrested to stop the Site C Dam.

“If push comes to shove, I for one — being a grandfather of 14 grandchildren who I absolutely adore — I am more than willing to be arrested as long as that will contribute to stopping this project,” he said.

“I know when that moment comes I will not be alone.”

The Last Paddle for the Peace?

About 300 boats took to the water Saturday in what could be the last Paddle for the Peace — held on a stretch of the Peace River that will be flooded if the $8.8 billion Site C dam is built.

Construction is due to start on the dam any day now despite a pending Treaty 8 legal challenge, due to be heard by the federal Supreme Court on July 20.

“This is a watershed moment in the province of British Columbia and in this country,” Phillip said. “We simply can not — we can not allow this to happen.”

Beth Steiner, 8, helps bag lettuce at her parents market garden stand in the Peace Valley. The land the Steiners grow everything from corn to watermelons on will be flooded if the Site C dam is built.

Calls for a moratorium on construction on Site C have gained strength recently with the Greater Vancouver Regional District board, representing 23 local governments and 2.5 million people, voting to ask Premier Christy Clark for a two-year moratorium on construction.

The Peace River Regional District — which includes Fort St. John, the city that would see the most economic activity from the dam — voted on Thursday to write a letter to Clark to request that all construction on Site C be stopped until active court cases regarding the project have been completed.

The B.C. government has been criticized for pushing ahead with the project while ignoring repeated calls for an independent review of costs and demand — a recommendation made by the government’s own panel.

David Suzuki: ‘We Fundamentally Failed’

Famed environmentalist David Suzuki changed his schedule to join the paddle on Saturday (and helped rescue some capsized canoeists while he was at it) because the fight for the Peace Valley is near and dear to his heart. During a keynote speech, he told the crowd about his involvement with stopping the Site C dam for the first time in 1981.

“Thirty-five years later, guess what? We’re fighting exactly the same battles all over again,” Suzuki told the crowd. “What we thought were victories were not victories at all, because we fundamentally failed. We failed to shift the way we see our place on the planet.”

Ranchers Dick and Renee Ardill know the drain of the 34-year fight against the dam all too well. When the dam was first defeated, Dick was a spry 54-year-old. Now he’s 88 and grasps his truck for balance as he walks.

Dick Ardill has spent his 88 years ranching in the Peace Valley. His parents homesteaded the land in 1910.

His daughter Renee is sick of telling their story.

“I’m tired of the whole thing,” she told DeSmog Canada during a break from baling hay. “I’m tired of the stupidity of it.”

“You have to just keep going on and doing your job and, if we lose and they build the thing, we’ll worry about that when the time comes. In the meantime, I’m hoping that someone comes to their senses.”

While the recent rejection of the Peace Valley Landowners Association legal challenge was disappointing, it’s not the end of the world, Renee says.

“The battle goes on.”

Injunctions Will Be Filed to Stop Site C Dam Construction

“This is the tenth year we’ve done this and if BC Hydro and B.C. have their way we won’t be doing it any more,” said Roland Willson, chief of West Moberly First Nation, before canoes were put in the water.

West Moberly Chief Roland Willson.

In an interview with DeSmog Canada, Willson said he’s holding out for the courts to make the right decision.

“The dam is a direct infringement of our treaty rights,” he said.

Willson said injunctions will be filed to stop any construction that will cause “irreparable harm.”

Farmer Ken Boon, who hosts the Paddle for the Peace on his land, says the early construction plans look like a soft start.

“I’m still confident this dam will not be built,” Boon said. “All we’ve got to do is win one court case.”

Ken Boon is confident the Site C dam will not be built.

Boon’s land will be flooded if the dam is built, but he has yet to be approached by BC Hydro about moving.

“I’m pretty sure they’re expecting a lot of these to go to expropriation if things carry on,” he said.

As it stands, Boon and his wife Arlene still aren’t thinking about moving.

‘We’re Being Mowed Over’

Shawna-Marie Phillips is less optimistic. If construction moves forward, a 3,000-man camp will be located one kilometre from her organic farm and ranch.

Sometimes it feels like she’s yelling into the void and nobody’s listening, she said.

Given that the Site C dam is the most expensive public project in B.C. history, yet only one reporter from a major news outlet attended Saturday’s event, Phillips could be forgiven for feeling out of sight and out of mind.

“I feel like we’re being mowed over,” she said.  “I get a feeling that this is the last time.”

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Authorizations allowing construction to begin immediately on the Site C dam on the Peace River in northeastern B.C. were issued on Tuesday by B.C.’s Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations — despite a pending legal challenge by the Treaty 8 First Nations.

This Saturday, hundreds of people in canoes and kayaks will paddle down the Peace River to protest the imminent construction of the dam and flooding of the river.

The $8.8 billion Site C dam — the most expensive public project in B.C. history — was approved by the B.C. government in December. If built, the dam will flood more than 100 kilometres of the Peace River and its tributaries, drowning agricultural land that experts say could produce fruit and vegetables for one million people.

Since the government’s decision to move forward with the project, expert voices have come out of the woodwork to speak out against the project.

Last week, the Greater Vancouver Regional District Board, representing 23 local governments and 2.5 million people, voted to ask Premier Christy Clark for a two-year moratorium on Site C. The board joins more than 30 other B.C. municipalities calling for a moratorium on the project.

“This permitting decision shows the provincial government’s disdain for B.C. ratepayers,” said Rob Botterell,  general counsel to the Peace Valley Landowner Association.  “BC Hydro’s own analysis shows that a two-year delay will save B.C. ratepayers about $200 million.  Who benefits from the urgency to construct Site C? Certainly not those of us paying the tab."

Dam Construction Will 'Indefinitely Scar' B.C.'s Relationship with First Nations

The First Nations Leadership Council recently said moving forward with the dam before the Treaty 8 legal challenge has been heard on July 20th will “indefinitely scar” B.C.’s relationship with First Nations.

This spring, energy economist Robert McCullough said that BC Hydro has dramatically underestimated the cost of producing power from Site C and that far cheaper energy alternatives are available.

Harry Swain, chair of the panel that examined Site C for the federal and provincial governments, has called the failure of the B.C. government to investigate alternatives to the dam a “dereliction of duty.” His criticism of the B.C. government's actions was called “unprecedented” by environmental law experts.

The cost of renewable alternatives have plummeted in cost in recent years and Site C’s business case assumptions are two to five years out of date. The Canadian Geothermal Energy Association says geothermal can meet all of B.C.'s future energy needs at a lower cost than Site C with fewer environmental impacts.

Despite growing opposition from experts, BC Hydro released polling on Tuesday indicating that support for the dam has increased amongst British Columbians.

The Abacus Data poll shows 59 per cent of those polled support building the Site C dam, while 22 per cent support the dam under certain circumstances. Seventeen per cent are opposed. Province-wide awareness of the Site C dam has increased significantly: 75 per cent of British Columbians surveyed are aware of Site C now, compared to 41 per cent in 2013.

The B.C. government says Site C will provide approximately 10,000 direct jobs during construction and will generate enough electricity to power about 450,000 homes per year.

However, the panel that reviewed BC Hydro’s application to build the dam found demand for the power had not been proven on the timeline provided and called for an independent review of costs by the B.C. Utilities Commission — a call the B.C. government has ignored.

Early indications are that some of Site C’s power will be used to power natural gas operations in northeast B.C. For at least the first four years, demand for the power will be insufficient so a portion will be exported at a projected loss of $800 million.

Photo: This section of the Peace River will be flooded if the Site C dam is built.

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The Treaty 8 First Nations have received notice from BC Hydro that work on the Site C dam could start as early as July 6 — despite court proceedings still being underway.

Treaty 8 First Nations have applied for judicial review of the federal government’s decision to grant an environmental assessment certificate, arguing the Site C dam infringes on their treaty rights. The joint review panel’s report on Site C found the dam will result in significant and irreversible adverse impacts on people in the Treaty 8 communities.

The federal appeal begins the week of July 20, 2015. But Treaty 8 First Nations say that BC Hydro has ignored requests to put construction on hold until the outcomes of the court proceedings are known. BC Hydro did not respond to a request for comment in time for publication.

“The provocative activities that the B.C. government is recklessly trying to advance are irreversible, and will leave an irreparable and permanent scar on the land,” said Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs. “These deliberate actions will also indefinitely scar B.C.’s relationships with First Nations.”

The 1,100-megawatt Site C dam would be the third dam built on the Peace River. It has been proposed for more than 30 years and with a price tag of $8.8 billion, it is the most expensive public project in B.C. history.

The project has been controversial due to its impact on farmland, infringement of treaty rights and concerns about the costs of the project.

The First Nations Leadership Council — comprised of the executives of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs, the First Nations Summit and the B.C. Assembly of First Nations — issued a press release Thursday stating the council will “fully support the Treaty 8 First Nations to address this injustice and to prevent damage to the Peace River Valley.”

Treaty 8 says BC Hydro intends to begin blocking off the main channel of the Peace River with booms this summer. BC Hydro also intends to clear 735 hectares of trees and vegetation.

“If construction begins, it will be understood as a clear message that this government has absolutely no respect for the Treaty 8 First Nation people, and is blatantly disregarding constitutionally recognized aboriginal title, rights and treaty rights,” Phillip said. “Further, rushing ahead of the courts to build this project is an irresponsible and negligent use of tax dollars.”

Robert Phillips of the First Nations Summit political executive said the provincial government seems to have tunnel vision when it comes to building the Site C dam.

“By denying the Treaty 8 First Nations their day in court, the government is making an outright statement that they are above democratic rights and the judicial system,” Phillips said. “This approach is unacceptable and an affront to the cultivation of constructive government-to-government relations between the provincial government and B.C. First Nations.”

Close to $50,000 has been donated toward the Treaty 8 legal fight through Victoria-based charity RAVEN.

The B.C. government has argued the Site C dam is the most cost-effective way to meet the province’s electricity needs and has rejected repeated calls for an independent review of costs by the B.C. Utilities Commission.

Harry Swain, the chair of the joint federal-provincial panel that reviewed Site C, criticized the B.C. government’s actions on the dam in March 2015, in comments called “unprecedented” by environmental law experts.

Photo: Grand Chief Phillip Stewart of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs at last year's Paddle for the Peace on the Peace River.

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Revelations from DeSmog Canada’s exclusive sit-down interview with Harry Swain, the chair of the panel that reviewed the $8.8 billion Site C dam, were raised during question period in the B.C. legislature on Thursday.

Andrew Weaver, Oak Bay-Gordon Head MLA and Deputy Leader of the B.C. Green Party, asked the government about the economics of the Site C dam project in light of Swain’s unprecedented interview.

Swain, a former Deputy Minister of Industry Canada and Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, is thought to be the first review panel member in Canadian history to speak out about a project in this manner. His comments to DeSmog Canada prompted follow-up by the Globe and Mail, CBC, CKNW and CFAX.

“Mr. Swain was very clear that the government was rushed in approving Site C, and British Columbians will pay for their haste,” Weaver said during question period. “As Mr. Swain said: ‘Wisdom would have been waiting for two, three, four years to see whether the projections they’ — that’s BC Hydro — ‘were making had any basis in fact.’ That’s not exactly a glowing endorsement for the fiscal underpinning of Site C.”

The panel that reviewed Site C predicted that the dam will lose $800 million in its first four years of production while it sells excess power for a third of its cost on the export market.

“My goodness, we could use that money to build a state-of-the-art sewage system in Victoria,” Weaver quipped.

Weaver continued during question period:

“Mr. Swain is only the most recent person to suggest waiting a few years to see if electricity demand for the project materializes. We could still build Site C down the road if necessary, but we could use the additional time to properly explore cheaper alternatives like our vast geothermal potential in B.C. We have the time. LNG final investment decisions are delayed or not happening at all or somewhere down the yellow brick road or perhaps in never-never land.”

Weaver asked Bill Bennett, the Minister of Energy and Mines: “Given the massive costs associated with rushing into Site C, will he hit the pause button on construction for two to four years, as recommended by Mr. Swain, and use the time to save British Columbians money and explore viable alternatives?"

Bennett responded saying, “I categorically disagree with the premise of the question” and then went on to say: “Fair enough questions about the need for the electricity, the cost of the project. These are all legitimate issues that we should be debating in this House.”

Bennett then quoted several excerpts from the panel’s report, including that Site C “would be the least expensive of the alternatives, and its cost advantages would increase with passing decades as inflation makes alternatives more costly” and that BC Hydro “has done a responsible job in forecasting.”

The panel's report also said it did not have the information, time or resources to look at the accuracy of cost estimates and recommended that, if the project proceeds, costs and need should be examined in detail by the province’s independent regulator, the B.C. Utilities Commission. The panel noted it could not conclude the dam was needed on the schedule presented and said the province had failed to investigate alternatives — something it was instructed to do 32 years ago, when the utilities commission first turned down the Site C dam on the Peace River. 

Swain called this failure to research alternatives a ‘dereliction of duty’ in his interview with DeSmog Canada.

“Those are very strong words from a very highly regarded senior official from the Canadian government,” Weaver said Thursday in the legislature. “To be even more blunt, it’s recklessness on the part of the government.”

Weaver continued:

"What we need right now is a government that is willing to show leadership on this, willing to put good policy ahead of ideological politics. My question to the minister is this. Will he listen to the call from every member of this side of the House, along with the expert opinion of the joint review panel and countless others, to send the Site C project to the British Columbia Utilities Commission for a proper regulatory review?"

Bennett continued his refusal to send the project for a review by the B.C. Utilities Commission.

Bennett responded:

"B.C. Hydro figures that we’re going to need 1,100 megawatts of electricity in 2024. We set about, over the past two years, to determine what’s the best way to get that 1,100 megawatts of electricity. We looked at absolutely everything, and the decision that we made on this side of the House was to honour the ratepayer. We chose the option that is the fairest, lowest cost to the ratepayer, but that side of the House wants us to do something different."

But the panel that reviewed the Site C proposal found the government hadn't looked at "absolutely everything," as Bennett states.

“The panel concludes that a failure to pursue research over the last 30 years into B.C.’s geothermal resources has left BC Hydro without information about a resource that BC Hydro thinks may offer up to 700 megawatts of firm, economic power with low environmental costs,” the panel's report read.

The Canadian Geothermal Energy Association (CanGEA) has argued geothermal can meet all of B.C.’s future energy needs at a lower cost than Site C with fewer environmental impacts. The association has requested meetings with Minister Bennett with no success.

"We welcome him to become more informed and to engage in constructive dialogue with the association and with our members," said Alison Thompson, chair of CanGEA.

In a press release, Weaver said the minister's talking points are missing the point. “This dam didn’t make sense for B.C. thirty years ago, and it doesn’t make sense now.”

“The question that needs to be asked is what’s the rush?” Weaver added. “LNG isn’t materializing along the timeline promised by government. Even if B.C. Hydro’s current projections are true, we still have up to four years before we need to start building the dam. We should use that time to explore alternatives before embarking on the largest infrastructure project in B.C. history.”

The full official transcript of the exchange in the Legislature can be viewed on Hansard.

BC Hydro is scheduled to begin construction on the Site C dam this summer, but the project is facing six legal challenges, including one that alleges that Cabinet erred in dismissing key portions of the joint review panel’s findings on the project.  

The dam would be the third on the Peace River and would flood 83 kilometres of the Peace Valley, impacting 13,000 hectares of agricultural land. The project is opposed by B.C.’s Treaty 8 First Nations, several of which have filed lawsuits.

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Geothermal energy offers a low-cost, clean and viable alternative to the $8 billion Site C dam proposed for the Peace River, according to a new report released Tuesday by the Canadian Geothermal Energy Association (CanGEA)

The report, Geothermal Energy: The Renewable and Cost Effective Alternative to Site C, estimates that geothermal power would ring in at about $73 per megawatt-hour (MWh). BC Hydro has estimated the cost of Site C at $83 per MWh. The report also says the proposed geothermal plants could be built for approximately $3.3 billion, less than half the cost of the Site C dam.

“Geothermal can be built as you need it, where you need it, and the capital costs are much lower,” CanGEA Chair Alison Thompson told a press conference in Victoria.

The B.C. cabinet is expected to decide whether or not to proceed with the Site C dam before Christmas. The federal and provincial governments issued environmental assessment certificates for the Site C dam in October, but the project is facing five legal challenges and calls from local governments to delay the decision for a year while other options are considered. The dam would impact 13,000 hectares of agricultural land in the Peace Valley and is opposed by B.C.’s Treaty 8 First Nations.

Read DeSmog Canada’s 12-part series on the Site C dam.

The joint review panel’s report on Site C called the province of B.C. out for failing to pursue research into B.C.’s geothermal resources over the past 30 years. That report provided wind beneath the wings of the geothermal industry, Thompson said.

“Evidence at the Site C hearings created new urgency for the mapping work we had already begun,” she said.

Now that favourability mapping indicates that geothermal can meet all of B.C.’s future energy needs, including the 1,100 MW of capacity and 5,100 gigawatt hours per year of energy that would come from the Site C dam.

“It’s been convenient to dismiss geothermal,” Thompson told the press conference. “This mindset around what people think geothermal is, it’s just not true anymore. And so B.C. has remained on the sidelines over the past 30 years when 25 other countries have installed geothermal power plants.”

Canada is the only country around the Pacific Ring of Fire that does not produce geothermal power at a commercial scale. (Read: 5 Reasons Why Geothermal is Nowhere in Canada.)

CanGEA’s new report lays out 10 key advantages of geothermal when compared to the Site C dam.

Those include the generation of more permanent jobs (2,000 permanent jobs for geothermal vs. 150 permanent jobs for the Site C dam) distributed throughout the province and a reduced need for transmission upgrades.

“The $1 billion northeast transmission line can be avoided or delayed,” Thompson said.

Thompson also pointed to a proposed geothermal power plant in Valemount, an area that consistently experiences brownouts due to its location at the end of a transmission line.

“That project provides base-load power for the area, provides economic stimulus and avoids the need to shore up that [transmission] line,” Thompson said.

There are also opportunities to decrease the greenhouse gas emissions of the oil and gas sector by electrifying the region, displacing the use of fossil fuels at well sites, for instance.

Oil and gas companies have helped identify B.C.’s geothermal potential through their drilling in the northeast of B.C. Often the water and gas that comes up out of the ground is piping hot, which presents another opportunity.

“They could run that through a heat exchanger, which then can be sent to the power plant,” Thompson said. “They can produce micro-power, enough probably for their own operations. They often, on purpose, cool the products before it goes into their machines. It’s a win-win for everybody.”

CanGEA is calling for a one-year moratorium on the final investment decision on Site C to allow time for further due diligence on geothermal. The industry group is also calling on the B.C. Utilities Commission to review its findings and make recommendations by November 2015.

“We’re crazy not to look at this further,” Oak Bay-Gordon Head Green MLA Andrew Weaver told DeSmog Canada. “The government has said many times that they want to protect the ratepayer … that requires them to look at geothermal. It would be irresponsible not to do it.”

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The provincial and federal governments have issued an environmental approval certificate for the Site C dam despite acknowledging it will cause significant adverse environmental effects.

“Those effects are justified in the circumstances,” says the decision statement signed by Leona Aglukkaq, Canada’s minister of environment.

The province must still decide whether to proceed with the 1,100-megawatt project based on an investment decision, expected by the end of this year.

“The final decision still has to go through the cabinet, so we’ll still be working to convince them it’s not the best decision,” said Andrea Morison of the Peace Valley Environment Association, a group that has fought the dam for decades.

The $8 billion project would be the third dam on the Peace River and would be located seven kilometres from Fort St. John, B.C.

The dam has been opposed by local farmers, ranchers and the Treaty 8 First Nations because it will flood 87 kilometres of the Peace River, impacting wildlife and flooding 30,000 acres of farmland, including an area the size of the city of Victoria within the Agricultural Land Reserve.

West Moberly Chief Roland Willson has already vowed to challenge the decision in court and has said the province can’t have both the Site C dam and liquefied natural gas (LNG) development, which requires gas from Treaty 8 territory.

The environmental assessment certificate is subject to 77 conditions, including establishing a fund of $20 million to compensate for lost agricultural lands and activities.

In May, a federal-provincial Joint Review Panel issued its report on Site C. The panel was ambivalent in its findings, saying both that the dam could provide cheap power but also that the costs needed to be examined further and that it’s not clear that the power will be needed on the timeline provided.

“The Joint Review Panel considering the dam’s impacts determined that they are so significant that only an ‘unambiguous need’ for the power would justify them. And BC Hydro did not demonstrate such a need,” said Karsten Heuer, president of the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y). “We don’t understand the basis on which the B.C. and federal governments could issue their approvals.”

Y2Y has argued that the Site C reservoir would seriously impede wildlife movement in the region.

“The Peace River Valley is located at the narrowest width of the Yellowstone to Yukon region and the existing Williston Reservoir already is a major blockage to wildlife movement,” Heuer said.

The joint review panel’s report included a recommendation to refer the project for review by the independent B.C. Utilities Commission, saying the panel didn’t have the time or resources to comment on the cost of the project.

“All British Columbia Hydro ratepayers should be concerned about that,” said Gwen Johansson, mayor of the District of Hudson’s Hope.

The panel also found that the province has failed to look at alternatives to the Site C dam for the past three decades. New maps released this month indicate B.C. has enough low-impact geothermal energy to power the entire province. 

Read DeSmog Canada's 12-part series on the Site C dam.

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Projects like the $7.9-billion Site C dam cannot be built “on the shoulders of communities,” says the mayor of Fort St. John, B.C., a city located just seven kilometres from the proposed hydro dam and its 1,700-man work camps.

Mayor Lori Ackerman told DeSmog Canada her community is holding its breath waiting for the province’s decision on the project.

“It is one of those things where we would just like the decision to be made so we know which way we’re going,” Ackerman said.

The provincial and federal governments are expected to issue a decision on the dam — the third on the Peace River — this fall.

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In her January presentation to the joint review panel assessing the project, Ackerman was emphatic that  “empowering the province should not disempower Fort St. John.”

“Many we spoke to felt the community would be run over by this project,” she said.  “Our community is at a saturation point for many of the services that our citizens want and need.”

In an interview with DeSmog Canada, Ackerman said residents recognize this dam has been on the books for decades, but “if you’re going to build it, don’t do it on the backs of the taxpayers here.”

Fort St. John is already struggling to manage the growth it has seen due to the fracking boom in B.C.’s natural gas fields — a boom that will only intensify if the province’s much-touted liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plans come to fruition. The city of 20,000 is already stretched for health care services, facing an affordable housing crisis and confronting an increase in drug and gang activity.

With an eight-year construction period and a potential for 1,700 workers living in camps near the city, the Site C dam has been the No. 1 issue for Fort St. John for the last couple of years, Ackerman said.

“It’s seven kilometres from our downtown. In between the downtown and the dam will be a 236-acre area that they will mine for aggregate and a 500-man camp,” Ackerman explained. “So all of this: the traffic, the noise, the dust, having that kind of population sitting on our doorstep, is going to impact our services.”

In her presentation to the joint review panel, Ackerman noted the project will affect the quality of life and cost of living for Fort St. John residents.

“Construction of Site C will be dependent to a large extent on the services and facilities provided by the City of Fort St. John,” she said.

Site C camps would bring 1,700 transient workers

In its report, the joint review panel noted Site C would pose “the usual health and social risks common to boom towns” — risks like the tragic beating death of Christopher Ball in downtown Fort St. John in July 2012.

Councillor Byron Stewart told the panel about that incident (both Ball and his two assailants lived in work camps) while highlighting his community’s concern that the transient workforce from the camps will put considerable strain on the city’s emergency resources and impact the safety of the community. 

While the Site C dam is projected to create about 10,000 person-years of direct employment during its eight-year construction period (or about 1,250 jobs per year), very few of those jobs would go to people in the Fort St. John area.

“The low local unemployment rate would mean that most of the project workers would come from other parts of the province and Canada,” the joint review panel’s report read.

The report also states that “the local economic upside would largely provide the resources to deal with possible problems, including those related to health, education, and housing, especially if the arrangements BC Hydro is willing to make with local authorities can be concluded.”

BC Hydro estimates that Site C would result in a total of $40 million in tax revenues to local governments. But thus far, an arrangement between BC Hydro and the city of Fort St. John hasn't been reached.

“We’re very actively having conversations with the proponent,” Ackerman said. “We want to ensure that we’re at the table with the province and BC Hydro when the decisions are made because we can be very much be a partner in this.”

Ackerman says she wants to ensure that whatever happens “the community is better off as a result of it.” That could mean everything from guarantees that local contractors will be hired to additional funding for policing.

Where will workers come from?

However, those types of promises are little solace to families who stand to lose their homes due to the dam construction. Esther and Poul Pedersen own a 160-acre farm above the proposed dam site and would have to move if the dam is built.

Poul and Esther Pedersen on their land overlooking the Peace River. Photo: Emma Gilchrist.

“They’re taking bids for work camps like it’s already been approved,” Poul said. “I’d like to know where they’re going to find the workers. There’s a shortage of workers already. Are they going to be bringing migrant workers over?”

Esther is concerned the projected positive economic impacts for Fort St. John won’t materialize.

“The workers will just fly in and fly out,” she said. “The only places that will be busy are the airports and the bars and the drunk tank.”

Fort St. John businessman Bob Fedderly echoed those concerns in an interview with Common Sense Canadian. 

“Camps aren’t the camps that they used to be,” he said. “It’s all done from outside, so when you start looking at the real spin-offs to the project, if you tear it apart one item at a time, are the spin-offs really there? Or are they cost items, lost opportunities to existing businesses?”

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It’s a sweltering 35 degrees as I pull up to a trailer housing the W.A.C. Bennett Dam visitor centre just outside Hudson’s Hope, 100 kilometres west of Fort St. John.

I’m here to see B.C.’s largest hydro dam first-hand. Damming the Peace River is back in the news this fall as the provincial and federal governments make up their minds about the Site C dam, which would be the third dam on this river.

I’m handed a fluorescent safety vest and am ushered on to a bus along with about 10 others.

Completed in 1967, the W.A.C. Bennett Dam is one of the world's largest earthfill structures, stretching two kilometres across the head of the Peace Canyon and creating B.C.’s largest body of freshwater, the Williston Reservoir. [view:in_this_series=block_1]

Two peppy young women are our guides today. They inform us we’ll be heading more than 150 metres underground into the dam’s powerhouse and manifold.

At the front of our tour bus, pictures of wildlife — grizzlies, lynx, moose, elk — are taped above the driver’s seat. Our guides enthusiastically tell us how 11 of 19 of North America’s big game species live around the dam.

My mind can’t help but wander to a paragraph I read in the joint review panel’s report on the Site C dam, released in May. It appeared on page 307 in a section titled “Panel’s Reflections.”

“A few decades hence, when inflation has worked its eroding way on cost, Site C could appear as a wonderful gift from the ancestors of that future society, just as B.C. consumers today thank the dam-builders of the 1960s. Today’s distant beneficiaries do not remember the Finlay, Parsnip, and pristine Peace Rivers, or the wildlife that once filled the Rocky Mountain Trench. Site C would seem cheap, one day. But the project would be accompanied by significant environmental and social costs, and the costs would not be borne by those who benefit,” the report read.

It’s a poignant moment of pause in a report that doesn’t provide a clear yes or no on whether the 1,100-megawatt dam should be built due to a lack of clear demand for the power, concerns about costs and considerable environmental and social costs.

The panel found risks to fish and wildlife include harmful and irreversible effects on migratory birds and species such as the western toad and short-eared owl. Given the severe effects of dam-building on wildlife, I find the pictures at the front of our tour bus a tad incongruous.

Underground, we’re kitted out with hardhats before entering the powerhouse. It’s as long as three football fields and has the dimensions of the Titanic. This dam can produce up to 2,855 megawatts of power — more than double that of the proposed Site C dam.

Just downstream, another dam — the Peace Canyon dam — produces another 700 megawatts of power. Combined, these two dams provide B.C. with one-third of its power.

Aside from already being home to two megadams, the Peace Country’s landscape is dotted with 16,267 oil and gas well sites and 8,517 petroleum and natural gas facilities, according to a 2013 report, Passages from the Peace, by the David Suzuki Foundation and Global Forest Watch.

“The Peace River region has been and is currently undergoing enormous stress from resource development,” read the joint review panel’s report on Site C.

Rancher Leigh Summer knows that stress firsthand. He was just 14 years old when his family’s ranch was flooded by the W.A.C. Bennett dam. Now Summer has three young children and his life could be disrupted again, this time by the Site C dam that would flood the last intact part of the Peace River. 

“The Peace River in British Columbia has paid her price for prosperity,” Summer says. “Why can’t we leave a piece of the Peace intact for future generations? Let them have a choice. If we flood it, we take that choice away from them, from ever seeing what the Peace River was like.”

If built, the Site C dam would flood 107 kilometres of the Peace River and its tributaries. BC Hydro says the power is needed to meet growing energy demand, but the joint review panel found that the crown corporation hadn’t proven the need for the Site C dam in the immediate future and has not adequately explored alternatives, such as geothermal.

Although BC Hydro has predicted power demand will balloon 40 per cent over the next 20 years, its 2014 financial reports show demand for power has remained relatively static since 2007.

“Justification must rest on an unambiguous need for the power and analyses showing its financial costs being sufficiently attractive as to make tolerable the bearing of substantial environmental, social and other costs,” the joint review panel wrote.

The Site C dam “would result in significant cumulative effects on fish, vegetation and ecological communities, wildlife,” they added.

“This is one of the last intact mountain ecosystems on the planet,” says Sarah Cox, senior conservation program manager for the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative. “Site C will make a major contribution toward severing that Rocky mountain chain that goes all the way from Yellowstone to Yukon.”

The Peace River is the only river to break the barrier of the Rocky Mountains between the Yukon south almost to Mexico.

“The science shows that vulnerable species like grizzly, wolverine and lynx will be greatly impacted to the extent that populations may not be recoverable,” Cox says.

Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative has joined forces with Sierra Club BC and the Peace Valley Environment Association to launch StopSiteC.org, dedicated to collecting petition signatures against the dam.

Although this fall is a crucial moment in the battle against Site C, it’s just one of many high-stakes moments in what has been a decades-long battle for residents of the Peace Valley.

“I’ve been living with it for 40 years. My hair went grey the first time around,” jokes Gwen Johansson, mayor of the District of Hudson's Hope. “That shadow has hung over the valley for a very long time.”

Gwen Johansson, a retired school teacher, lives on the banks of the Peace River near Hudson's Hope. Photo: Emma Gilchrist.

A flood impact sign on Gwen Johansson's gate shows how high the waters of the Site C reservoir would rise. Photo: Emma Gilchrist.

Johansson has lived in her house on the banks of the Peace River since 1975. In 1982, the Site C dam was postponed indefinitely after a review by the B.C. Utilities Commission.

“They said that Hydro had not proven the need for it and, if there was need, they hadn’t proven that this was the best way to get the power,” Johansson says.

“This time they’re going to make sure that nobody gets to examine these questions,” she added, referring to the province's decision to exempt the project from review by the independent regulator (the B.C. Utilities Commission) this time around.

Johansson has been part of a chorus of voices calling on the province to listen to the joint review panel’s recommendation to refer the project to the B.C. Utilities Commission for more in-depth analysis of costs and alternatives.

“It’s almost as though they worry that if they don’t get it done right away they won’t be able to do it,” the retired teacher says.

This week, Johansson was at a press conference in Vancouver trying to get the attention of the media and British Columbians. She brought Peace Valley watermelon, cantaloupe and honey for the crowd.  

One of the biggest obstacles for those in the Peace Valley is that their area — a 14-hour drive from Vancouver — is out of sight, out of mind for the majority of British Columbians. 

“If the decision-makers have to look out the window at the consequences of their decisions, they have to think harder about their decisions,” Johansson says.

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