Victoria, Hydro drag heels on alternative energy

By Don Whiteley
Vancouver Sun
14-Dec-2005

The provincial government's abrupt decision a week ago to send BC Hydro back to the drawing board on its 20-year Integrated Electricity Plan (IEP) is one more indication that this province is suffering from a severe case of constipation when it comes to future electric power needs.

The move comes only a couple of months after Hydro itself abruptly withdrew its application to build a natural gas-fired power generating station at Duke Point on Vancouver Island. Given today's natural gas spot price of $14 per thousand cubic feet, perhaps that's a blessing in disguise. But at the time, it was a serious slap in the face to the province's independent power producers.

Further to that decision, Hydro's call for additional power supply from independent producers, originally scheduled for the fall, is now going to happen in the new year. Hydro just posted the terms of the call on its website last week.

And there's growing evidence that B.C. is falling well behind almost every other jurisdiction in the country -- if not in North America -- when it comes to promoting the use of alternative energy supplies such as wind or tidal power. While other provinces are installing wind turbines, B.C. is still putting roadblocks in the way.

All this is coming when it is now clearly recognized that the province can't meet its energy needs through conservation alone, and as Hydro's reliance on external power sources -- it now imports more than 10 per cent annually -- continues to grow. Less than a month ago, the B.C. Progress Board chastised the province for twiddling its thumbs on this issue for the past 20 years.

Depending on whom you speak to, the fault lies either in Victoria through a provincial government that won't issue clear directions, or at Hydro where the utility has not yet built a good financial case for its marquee Site C dam project.

David Austin, speaking for the Independent Power Producers of British Columbia, thinks the Site C project is the reason Victoria balked at the IEP. In a letter to Hydro, Austin states: "If BC Hydro generating resources are to be included in some way as part of the IEP, then at a minimum, BC Hydro should have prepared and made public for scrutiny the corresponding financial models. The IPPBC has repeatedly asked for BC Hydro's Site C financial model and none has been received. As a result, the IPPBC has absolutely no confidence in the price information that BC Hydro has provided to date with respect to Site C."

Guy Dauncey, president of the B.C. Sustainable Energy Association, sees the main problem as a planning "vacuum" in Victoria, where electricity policy-making has been abandoned in favour of letting the B.C. Utilities Commission call the shots.

"There's a very clear policy vacuum," says Dauncey. "Last year we missed the opportunity to have a major wind-assembly plant built in B.C. -- probably Squamish -- because of the policy vacuum. They were looking for a place at the end of a rail line to put a wind-assembly plant. They wanted B.C. to put 1,000 megawatts of wind power into the grid to show there's a local market."

Dauncey's association produced a recent report that document's the potential for alternative energy potential in the province.

"Wind, solar, tidal, geothermal and other technologies, combined with energy savings from efficiency measures, would produce 84,000 gigawatt hours a year," his report states. "This is 50 per cent more than BC Hydro's current total generation, and enough power for 8.4 million homes."

In an interview, Dauncey said no jurisdiction in North America is better situated for the advancement of "green" technologies: "We are the most favourably placed jurisdiction in the whole of North American for having 100 per cent green power."

But while Alberta, Manitoba, Quebec, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island are in the forefront of developing wind power, B.C. has yet to build its first commercial projects, although two have been approved -- Sea Breeze Power Corp. for a project on northern Vancouver Island, and Nai Kun Wind for a project on Haida Gwaii

Sea Breeze has approval to build a 450-megawatt wind farm, but hasn't been able to reach an agreement yet with BC Hydro to buy the power.

Instead, the company last month applied to the National Energy Board for permission to build a 550-mw undersea power cable from Victoria to Port Angeles so it can sell power into the U.S. market.

Tidal power has huge potential too, with three companies on Vancouver Island in various stages of development, one only months away from a pilot project at Race Rocks designed to prove the concept. But there is unhappiness in this area, too.

"That's our Niagara Falls," says Michael Maser, communications director at Blue Energy Canada Ltd. "But we're not pumping a single kilowatt of tidal energy in this province. That's staggering."

Blue Energy hopes to tap tidal power with a project in Johnstone Strait north of Campbell River.

Dauncey concurs, pointing out that the United Kingdom is pouring millions of pounds into the development of tidal energy in recognition of its value as an emerging technology.

"Tidal is the firmest of the non-firms because you can predict it, and you know exactly when it's coming in," he said "At the moment, we're losing the race. Britain is jumping ahead and throwing money at tidal energy."

All these developments lead to serious concerns that neither Hydro nor the province are moving quickly enough, nor are they prepared to provide sufficient catalysts to get alternative energy projects moving.

A provincial Task Force on Alternative Energy was recently struck and is expected to issue a report in the new year, while at the same time the Ministry of Energy Mines and Petroleum Resources is revising its overall energy policy.

Other jurisdictions are building things.

don_whiteley@telus.net