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B.C. Hydro, owned by and working for B.C. ratepayers, is Victoria's largest Crown corporation and its key electrical utility.

As such, it has a twofold mandate: To supply B.C.'s residential, commercial and industrial customers with the lowest-cost power and to help stimulate economic growth.

But Hydro has been behaving more like a privately-held company these days and much of the time it does its business behind doors. When it does make announcements, it gives out mixed signals.

Case in point: Meeting Vancouver Island's growing demand for power.

Several years ago, with virtually no public input or look at alternatives, Hydro and the B.C. government decided the Island's demand would best be served with a natural gas pipeline from the Mainland.

With U.S.-based private sector Williams Pipelines, Hydro applied to the National Energy Board to build the line from the Sumas gas transportation hub to a site near Cherry Point, Wa. From there the Georgia Strait Crossing (GSX) line would run underwater to a point near Duncan to connect to the Island's existing pipeline system.

The GSX was designed to supply future gas-fired electricity generation projects. Here, Hydro and another private sector partner planned to build the Vancouver Island Generation project, a 265-megawatt plant at Duke Point. But the project's costs keep escalating and both industrial and environmental groups have expressed concerns about how it's being handled.

The U.S.-base Calpine has since left, leaving Hydro to go-it-alone with no expertise in gas pipelines.

Now Hydro's announced a postponement of the project while it looks at private-sector options. But it still wants to build the GSX pipeline and has tried to prevent a NEB hearing from reviewing alternatives, such as extra undersea power cables or coalbed methane.

Why is gas the only solution?

Handing over its customer service division and other non-core assets to Bermuda-based Accenture is another example of the utility acting with little public scrutiny. Indeed, if it were a publicly-traded company, taxpayers would get more data on its movements.

As shareholders in a government-owned company, surely we have the same right to be informed as those in a commercial company.