Burning natural gas to meet Vancouver Island's electricity needs may not make economic sense, and if BC Hydro just waited a couple of years, it might come to that conclusion itself, says the former chairman of the B.C. Utilities Commission.
"I think if this project were delayed by two or three years, it would die of its own accord," Dr. Mark Jaccard told roughly 400 concerned citizens at the Port Theatre Monday.
In a recently concluded study, co-authored by Rose Murphy, Jaccard used BC Hydro's own numbers and premises to conclude that small, privately operated energy projects makes more sense than building the Georgia Strait pipeline and Duke Point power plant.
The report, conducted by Simon Fraser University's Energy and Materials Research Group, concludes small co-generation, micro-hydro and wood-waste burning projects could supply the province's future energy needs, without tying the Island to the mainland through a pipeline.
They would also produce far fewer harmful emissions.
Power plant opponents have suggested the Island's future energy needs could be met with alternative "green" energy sources, like wind and wave generation.
But those technologies are still in the development stage and would be too costly to implement, Jaccard's study says.
However, the potential already exists for other alternatives, like co-generation and micro-hydro.
Those alternatives would cost the average consumer roughly $3 a year more than the GSX and power plant project, Jaccard said, but would eliminate some risks and potential hidden costs in GSX and power plant proposal.
Among those risks and hidden costs is natural gas prices, the price of which no one can predict, and the inevitable higher costs of meeting stricter greenhouse gas reduction targets.
Co-generation taps the surplus energy used in heating large commercial and institutional buildings, like colleges and hospitals.
Micro-hydro uses streams, but no dams, to turn turbines.
"In British Columbia, today, those are very inexpensive," Jaccard said.
Following his talk at the Port Theatre, Jaccard took his message to City Hall, at the invitation of the Nanaimo Citizen's Organizing Committee (NCOC).
Jaccard urged council to ask BC Hydro to take a step back and look at some of the alternatives.
NCOC member Andy Rowe said his group was doing the homework and asking the questions that council should be asking.
Mayor Gary Korpan said council had received a "mass" of information on the proposal, and was waiting for an environmental assessment before taking an official position. But council has already taken a position on the GSX pipeline project. Council and the Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities Association have officially endorsed the GSX project.
