Site C: How much support will BC NDP lose if they refuse to cancel?

If PR passes going ahead with Site C will cost the NDP dearly in its Coast heartland. The Vancouver Island seats could easily go mostly Green instead of Orange. The on going distruction of the Peace River during the next election would be handing the Greens a cudgel to play whackamole with. The environmental file is a deal maker for many of the progressive people who vote NDP.  I am still hopeful, I e-mailed my MLA and his office responded with a thank you for the support to stop it. Inside the caucus I am pretty sure there are many MLA's who are also looking at the Indigenious Rights aspect of continuing to build in the face of indigenous dissent.  The NDP does not need to have indigenous and environmental activists pursuing it during the election because they are building a money sink. The Liberal's will track the rising construction costs and blame the NDP for them. It will be a fun time for the NDP.

CHEK news is the best loved Vancouver Island news site. This poll shows the depth of the feeling for the Site C project in the BC NDP's Coast base.  A wrong decision will cost them dearly. At 88% when I voted.

https://www.cheknews.ca/chek-point-poll-site-c-dam-cancelled-completed-3...

The project hasn't proven anything yet but the fact remains that it was on budget and on time until the NDP took over and initiated their ( necessary, I agree) review. Both pro and con are spinning their wheels with extremist language and the truth of the matter is that this delay has endangered the river diversion timetable, which, if delayed by a year due to high water flows will be costly.

Now that there is certainty, let the professionals do their due diligence on timing and geophysical challenges in order to mitigate delays. Using more or more productive equipment may still allow them to meet the diversion schedule and so will retaining more water behind the existing Bennett and Peace Canyon dams. 

From kropotkin1951:

This poll shows the depth of the feeling for the Site C project in the BC NDP's Coast base. 

​Sorry, but it shows nothing of the kind. Pardon me, perhaps it does show the 'depth of feeling'. when I looked, the poll showed 51% wishing to cancel the project, to 49% wishing to complete it. 

But it also shows only jsut over 14,000 people responded to the poll, which is hardly enough for any politician to get excited about.

What baffles me is all those NDP'ers who were running around touting the Leap Manifesto apparently didn't bother to read it, because in it's support documentation there was the requirement for 270 new 1300MW hydroelectric power plants.

Where did they think these plants were going to be built, in the middle of Arizona? Sahara desert?

Summary

We have not been asked to make recommendations or to identify which option has the highest cost to ratepayers or more significant implications than others. Nevertheless, we have provided our view that not only is the suspension scenario the greatest cost to ratepayers of the three scenarios, it also has other negative implications. We take no position on which of the termination or completion scenarios has the greatest cost to ratepayers. The Illustrative Alternative Portfolio we have analyzed, in the low-load forecast case, has a similar cost to ratepayers as Site C. If Site C finishes further over budget, it will tend to be more costly than the Illustrative Alternative Portfolio is for ratepayers. If a higher load forecast materializes, the cost to ratepayers for Site C will be less than the Illustrative Alternative Portfolio. We have provided a discussion of the risk implications of each alternative in order to assist in the evaluation

http://www.sitecinquiry.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/A-24_Final-Report...

The BC NDP had a choice and they chose the wrong option. They are betting that unlike the last decades our consumption demand is going to increase dramatically and not continue decreasing or remain stable and that emerging technologies will make no progress in providing cheaper power through options that produce power closer to the Lower Mainland were it is needed thus reducing line loss and the need for large transmission lines that disrupt wildlife. 

I am sure the Environment Minister, George Heyman had many long conversations about the implications of this dam project but they would mostly have been with the building trades unions that are dominated by international unions headquartered in the US.  Knowing George I am sure he spent way more time talking to Brian Cochrane than anyone in the environmental movement. Heyman is a backroom dealing  slime ball and always has been throughout his career in the union business.

Personally I prefer to read the actual BC Utilities Rerport and draw my own conclusions not be lead by the nose by the right wing media. You can post spin, I'll just post the facts.

kropotkin1951 wrote:

Personally I prefer to read the actual BC Utilities Rerport and draw my own conclusions not be lead by the nose by the right wing media. You can post spin, I'll just post the facts.

 

OK. You are entitled to your own opinions but not to your own facts. I do believe, however, that you are right on target with your opinion about George Heyman. I expect any reader to use critical thinking to comprehend media articles. If you want to take a short cut to bask in only media that supports your biases, you only do yourself a disservice, my dear chap - and that is a fact.

Martin N. wrote:

I think they made the correct decision but that it was a decision steeped in political considerations, not financial or environmental ones.

The plain fact is that the NDP can stand the howling from its far left because the far left has no other place to go. On the other hand, the only path to majority government is to woo back the interior ridings which are heavily dependent on resource jobs. Premier Horgan is the premier of BC, not the premier of the south coast and the fantasy islands.

If Horgan could secure a majority from only the south coast and the fantasy islands, Site C would be shut down immediately, no matter how many billions it cost.

I don't know how far along the project was and there may have been no practical way to stop it, but politically this makes no sense to me.

The BC Liberals were very adamant in their support of Site C. Does it not stand to reason from that that those who supported Site C would have supported the Liberals? Why would they change their support? And I know technically Horgan didn't promise to cancel, however he got public support on the basis of his promise to review the project. Now people who were hoping for the project cancellation feel betrayed, many of them won't support Horgan in 2021. Even if the "far left" as you characterize them, have no place else to go, they can still choose to sit out the next election, and that could cost the NDP in close seats they barely won. Further to that, the Greens are also an option for those who oppose this project, and it's possible that bleeding support to the Greens may cost the NDP seats it already has. Are there really that many people in the Interior who are going to decide, "well, I voted for the Liberals because of Site C, but now that the NDP is continuing the project, I'll vote for them instead?" Not to mention that this severly sets back, if not outright dashes, hopes of the BC NDP winning crucial Green votes in seats like Burke Mountain that barely went Liberal. All that hard work designed to convince Green voters that the NDP shares their values in the aftermath of the election results that was crucial to the BC NDP taking over, thrown out the window.

It appears that the environmentalist-union divisions within the BC NDP that were made evident during the Clayquot Sound controversey have not been properly addressed. This needs to be done yesterday.

Aristotle said:

"The BC Liberals were very adamant in their support of Site C. Does it not stand to reason from that that those who supported Site C would have supported the Liberals? Why would they change their support?"

Part of the logic on the NDP's part, I believe, is that approval of a few projects is necessary to build confidence in Liberal voters that a BC government can strike a balance between the environment and responsible resource development.  They want to show middle of the road Liberal voters they can manage the economy, and by their calculus this is a low risk way to do it.  Bleeding support to the greens worries them much less than bleeding support to the Liberals.   

I think the BC NDP are absolutely sincere on PR, and it will be a tough sell and a tougher referendum campaign.   If BC gets it, I can imagine a future where the NDP turns into mini-Liberals with the Greens as the party of conscience.

For a little perspective.

Site C, as noted upthread, will permanently remove about 3800 hectares of Class 1-5 farmland.

Metro Vancouver has almost 61,000 hectares of agricultural land. most of which would be Class 1 land. Metro Vancouver includes Langley Township, but does not include any land east of Langely Township and west of Hope. There is another roughly 71,000 hectares of prime agricultural land in that area. So there is about 132,000 hectares of (mostly) Class 1 agricutural land within 100 km's of the City of Vancouver.

Now, I don't know what percentage of the 3800 hectares in the Peace is Class 1, but for the sake of argument I will accept that it all is. That means the amount to be lost is approximately 3% of the farmland in Metro Vancouver and the Fraser Valley. 

Bear in mind there is still the Okanagan, the Kootenays, and other areas, which also have farmland.

It is very clear that Site C is not a threat to food production in British Columbia.

Aristotleded24 wrote:

Martin N. wrote:

I think they made the correct decision but that it was a decision steeped in political considerations, not financial or environmental ones.

The plain fact is that the NDP can stand the howling from its far left because the far left has no other place to go. On the other hand, the only path to majority government is to woo back the interior ridings which are heavily dependent on resource jobs. Premier Horgan is the premier of BC, not the premier of the south coast and the fantasy islands.

If Horgan could secure a majority from only the south coast and the fantasy islands, Site C would be shut down immediately, no matter how many billions it cost.

I don't know how far along the project was and there may have been no practical way to stop it, but politically this makes no sense to me.

The BC Liberals were very adamant in their support of Site C. Does it not stand to reason from that that those who supported Site C would have supported the Liberals? Why would they change their support? And I know technically Horgan didn't promise to cancel, however he got public support on the basis of his promise to review the project. Now people who were hoping for the project cancellation feel betrayed, many of them won't support Horgan in 2021. Even if the "far left" as you characterize them, have no place else to go, they can still choose to sit out the next election, and that could cost the NDP in close seats they barely won. Further to that, the Greens are also an option for those who oppose this project, and it's possible that bleeding support to the Greens may cost the NDP seats it already has. Are there really that many people in the Interior who are going to decide, "well, I voted for the Liberals because of Site C, but now that the NDP is continuing the project, I'll vote for them instead?" Yes. More hinterland voters vote for whomever promises the better future as opposed to flocking to the colours. There are a lot of potential NDP votes there. Not to mention that this severly sets back, if not outright dashes, hopes of the BC NDP winning crucial Green votes in seats like Burke Mountain that barely went Liberal. All that hard work designed to convince Green voters that the NDP shares their values in the aftermath of the election results that was crucial to the BC NDP taking over, thrown out the window. I believe that by the time an election is called, the NDP brain trust will have the 'too clever by half' Greenweaver sorted. Weaver's henchmen are single issue wing nuts who will self-destruct in time. ( the cynical part of me says it will occur with a little push from the more mendacious corner of the dipper back room minders.

It appears that the environmentalist-union divisions within the BC NDP that were made evident during the Clayquot Sound controversey have not been properly addressed. This needs to be done yesterday. Divide and conquer is still a valid strategy. Especially for the ambitious Weaver.

Fair comment jas - thanks, learning lots from this thread.   

Well, there's one interesting thing. The 'greens' in BC are the only greens in the world opposed to renewable, sustainable, fossil-fuel free electricity.

Here's a little exercise for those who want to know the difference between electricity when it's available (wind, solar, etc.), and electricity when it's demanded (hydro, fossil-fuel, nuclear).

How many devices in BC, of what electrical draw, are run by automatic systems. that is, air conditioning, or freezers, or electric heaters? How would you accommodate those devices within a electrical generation system with varying output?