Power struggle: Debate over Island's energyDebate rages over Island's
energy future
22 October 2001, pA1 |
| Shawn Thomas, a Hydro senior vice-president, said without the
pipeline the Island faces a critical power crunch. And action is needed
now. "In the year 2004-05, unless steps are taken, Vancouver Island is hitting the wall in terms of its supply of electricity relative to its demand," Thomas said. "There's a key period in particular, through the late part of mid-December to mid-January, where if we don't move forward with these proposals, Vancouver Island has greater demand than it does supply." |  Debra Brash, Times Colonist / Arthur Caldicott, left,
stands firm with farm owners Shirley and Dave Thomson against the proposed
Georgia Strait Crossing pipeline. The route goes right through their Cobble Hill
property which they have owned since 1967. |
Thomas said that period is a time when lights are on longer and when more electricity on the Island is used for heating. Exacerbating this is a limit on how much power Hydro can move on its transmission lines at such peak periods, he said.
"If you look at that transmission system like a highway, it's gridlocked," Thomas said. "It's a simple issue: on Vancouver Island, and the rest of B.C., the demand for electricity will be greater than the capacity of the system to supply it."
But Hydro's natural gas plan, which could end up costing more than a $1 billion, faces fierce opposition from critics who believe the utility has more environmentally friendly -- and less costly -- alternatives.
Building gas-fuelled power plants would boost greenhouse gases, which some scientists believe contribute to climate change, and increase air pollution, critics say.
A coalition of opponents to the Georgia Strait Crossing pipeline -- abbreviated as GSX by B.C. Hydro -- has urged the B.C. government to drop natural gas projects until a provincial energy taask force completes its work.
The debate is simmering in the runup to a hearing by a federal energy and environment panel into GSX. The panel is holding five meetings this week on how to participate in the hearing.
The $260-million pipeline would bring gas across the strait to the Island near Cobble Hill, where it would hook up with the Centra Gas pipeline.
It is a joint venture between Hydro and Williams Gas Pipeline, a U.S. firm.
The pipeline is meant to feed a proposed $300-million, 260-megawatt generating plant in Port Alberni, a joint development with Calpine Corp., another U.S. company. (A megawatt of electricity is roughly enough to power 1,000 homes.)
A provincial environmental assessment of the plant is expected to move to a second stage, but Port Alberni council has already voted against rezoning the site Hydro wants for the plant.
The pipeline is also meant to feed the troubled 260-megawatt Island Cogeneration Plant (ICP) near Campbell River, which was supposed to begin operation last year. Owned by Calpine, the plant -- designed to provide steam for the nearby Elk Falls pulp mill -- has run into trouble with its prototype technology. It has been repeatedly forced to shut down.
Another fear for pipeline opponents is Hydro's long-term plan for a third plant for the Island -- a 640-megawatt proposal pencilled in for the Duncan area, with costs likely in the $500 million range.
"The public has had no chance to discuss any of this," said Tom Hackney, of the Sierra Club and a director of the GSX Concerned Citizens Coalition.
"Why don't we look at the whole power supply issue for the province, rather than pretending that it's just about supplying power for Vancouver Island?"
Arthur Caldicott, a computer programming consultant from Cobble Hill, is so concerned he set up a Web site called SqWalk.com to provide information about the projects.
Caldicott lives a kilometre away from the pipeline route and is not directly affected. But after attending information meetings about the project, "I found there were just too many things wrong with this," he said. "There's too much of a big corporation dictating to a community what's going to happen, rather than consulting with us."
Thomas said Hydro has held numerous public meetings and posted information on its Web site to explain the pipeline project.
This followed a key policy change in the late 1990s away from a proposal to upgrade the Burrard Thermal plant in the Lower Mainland. Outside of hydroelectric dams that provide the bulk of B.C.'s power, the natural-gas plant in Port Moody is the biggest supplier of electricity in the province, capable of generating 950 megawatts of power -- about 12 per cent of the province's needs.
But the B.C. Liberals campaigned in the last election for the phase-out of Burrard because of concerns about its emissions. And Hydro now believes that more power should instead be generated on Vancouver Island, which currently relies for 80 per cent of its electricity from the mainland.
"Burrard Thermal is already a significant part of our generation backbone," said Thomas. "But is it fair to ask the people who live in the Fraser Valley airshed to absorb a greater level of emissions from Burrard to meet supply for people who live on Vancouver Island?"
The Island has depended on power from the mainland since the 1950s, when transmission lines were strung to bring additional electricity here.
Hydro maintains one of the crucial reasons for the GSX pipeline is the fact two underwater transmission lines to the Island are aging and key components have to be replaced if their use is to continue.
Cost of replacing those lines, running from Tsawwassen to Duncan, would be about $360 million, $100 million more than the cost of the gas pipeline, Thomas said.
Moreover, growing demand for gas on the Island requires upgrading of the existing 10-year-old Island pipeline, connected to the mainland via Texada Island, at a cost "upwards of $100 million," he said.
And "you still haven't dealt with the issue of additional generation being required (for the Island) to meet those peak periods of time.
"So when you add all of these things together, the cost of the pipeline is significantly better than the alternatives."
Mark Jaccard, former chairman of the B.C. Utilities Commission, believes Hydro has not made its case.
Suggesting that either Burrard Thermal has to be expanded or natural gas plants built on the island is a "false dichotomy," said Jaccard, a professor of resource and environmental management at Simon Fraser University. "Hydro could generate 1,000 megawatts of new power without doing either," he said.
Co-generation plants that capture waste energy at lumber mills, manufacturing plants, hospitals, schools and universities to generate electricity could achieve this, said Jaccard.
The pipeline project effectively locks in the Crown corporation's power strategy for the next 10 years, making a major part of the provincial task force into energy redundant, Jaccard said.
Instead of "megaprojects by a monopoly" the province should look at small, efficient and environmentally friendly power generation by independent providers, he said.
Hydro has responded by promising green energy demonstration plants for the Island to generate 20 megawatts of power from wind and wave power through private companies.
It also has plans to retrofit schools, universities and hospitals over three years at a cost of up to $45 million to increase energy efficiency.
Still, Larry Bell, chairman and CEO of B.C. Hydro, says these efforts will not be enough to forgo the need to generate more power on the Island with natural gas.
Environmental groups like the David Suzuki Foundation worry that Hydro is ignoring the problem of greenhouse gases. The province and country have made commitments to cut such gases but B.C. energy policies show such commitments are being ignored, said Gerry Scott, the foundation's climate change director.
In response to such concerns, Hydro has a plan to offset greenhouse gases it will generate on the Island. This involves investing in projects that reduce the gases elsewhere.
The first project was to invest in a plan by Norseman Engineering to use waste gas from a Surrey landfill to fuel a boiler used by a forest products company. Hydro is negotiating a similar deal to use methane gas produced by the Hartland Avenue landfill, Greater Victoria's regional garbage dump.
Hydro's Thomas said the corporation is looking seriously at all kinds of alternative energy but much of the technology remains untested.
"You would not build a massive wave project with unproven technology," he said. "It would be irresponsible. We are taking steps that are appropriate and prudent, and our focus is to do these things on Vancouver Island."
NOW HEAR THIS
A federal panel is conducting an environmental assessment of the Canadian portion of the Georgia Strait Crossing, the natural gas pipeline proposed by B.C. Hydro and its U.S. partner Williams Gas Pipeline.
The pipeline would bring gas from Washington state, crossing Georgia Strait to Vancouver Island, near Cobble Hill.
A hearing by the three-person panel is next spring. But the process is so complicated, the National Energy Board is holding public meetings to let people know how they can participate.
Ottawa has offered $100,000 to help people make submissions.
The panel is chaired by Elizabeth Quarshie, a NEB member and engineer. Other members are Rowland Harrison, another NEB member and lawyer, and Bryan Williams, a lawyer and retired B.C. Supreme Court chief justice.
Sessions on how to participate in a public hearing all start at 7 p.m.
- Cobble Hill, today, at Arbutus Ridge Golf and Country Club, 3515 Telegraph Rd.
- Saltspring Island, Tuesday, at the Wheelhouse Room, Harbour House Hotel, 121 Upper Ganges Rd.
- Sidney, Wednesday, Mary Winspear Community Cultural Centre, 2243 Beacon Ave.
- Saturna Island, Thursday, Saturna Community Hall, Saturna Island.
- North Pender Island, Friday, St. Peter's Anglican Church Parish Hall, 4703 Canal Rd.
HOW TO MAKE SUBMISSIONS
The energy policy task force established by the provincial government is not holding public hearings. But it has asked for submissions, preferably by e-mail, on proposed energy policies by Nov. 2.
Jack Ebbels, deputy minister of energy and mines, heads the five-person task force.
The provincial government announced formation of the group in August at the same time it froze B.C. Hydro rates for another 18 months.
Extending the freeze was necessary, said Premier Gordon Campbell, "to give ratepayers the stability they need while the task force looks at ways to generate greater benefits for British Columbians and the changes (in energy policies) are put in place."
Deadline for a draft report is Nov. 30. The task force will consult with "selected parties" in mid-January before submitting a final report by Feb. 15, 2002. The government plans to announce a new energy policy for B.C. two weeks after that.
Submissions can be e-mailed to Eskakun.sagegroup@telus.net or mailed to Eleanor Skakun, c/o Sage Group Management Consultants, Suite 720, 880 Douglas St. Victoria, V8W 1G2. The phone number is 384-2124; fax submissions can be sent to 384-2102
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