SPEC joins GSXCCC in opposing Duke Point Power

Immediate Release: Jan. 11, 2005

SPEC joins GSX Coalition in opposing Duke Point power plant.

The Society Promoting Environmental Conservation (SPEC) is joining the Georgia Strait Crossing Concerned Citizen’s Coalition (GSXCCC) in opposing a second attempt by BC Hydro and its private partner Pristine Power Corporation to build a 252 mw gas-fired power plant at Duke Point near Nanaimo.

“It was due to GSXCCC and thousands of Vancouver Island residents that BCHydro’s first attempt at constructing a fossil-fuel power plant at Duke Point was rejected by the BCUC (BC Utilities Commission) in 2003,” said SPEC President Gerry Thorne. “And the way Duke Point will finally be put to rest is by again working together to demonstrate the potential harm that would result if Duke Point were constructed.”

An independent analysis conducted in 2002 by SENES consultants for SPEC, GSXCCC and the David Suzuki Foundation, found that Duke Point would pump dangerous amounts of nitrous oxide, sulphur dioxide, fine particulate matter and other harmful air pollutants into the Nanaimo and Georgia Basin airshed.

“Duke Point would, moreover, emit more than 900,000 tonnes of greenhouse gases annually,” said Thorne. “This is ironic given that just last month the Provincial Government released its Climate Change Plan that calls for a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in BC.”

In the 1970s SPEC was part of a province-wide coalition that prevented former Social Credit Premier WAC Bennett from building nuclear power plants on Vancouver Island. SPEC is also an intervenor in the process that has so far prevented a US corporation from building a gas power plant at Sumas that would adversely affect the air quality in Abbotsford and the Lower Fraser Valley.

The BC Utilities Commission will begin public hearings on Duke Point on January 17 in Vancouver.

Information: SPEC 604-736-7732 www.spec.bc.ca