‘Slow-Motion Disaster’: Who’s Overseeing Site C?

..from the above piece

quote:

Meanwhile, in Labrador and Manitoba…

In Newfoundland and Labrador, a $37.5 million Commission of Inquiry is underway — including a forensic audit — to determine where things went sideways with the hugely over-budget Muskrat Falls dam, whose $12.7 billion price tag will add $1,800 a year to the annual hydro bills of every household in the province.

Vardy said while the commission can pinpoint what went wrong and make recommendations, it can’t address what he calls the “democratic deficit.”

“Which is what happened in our governance system that allowed us to go down this road without correction,” Vardy said in an interview.

In Manitoba, where the over-budget Keeyask dam is also causing hydro rates to soar, the former head of the province’s Public Utilities Board is among those calling for a forensic audit to examine why things went so wrong.

Graham Lane, who chaired the utilities board from 2004 to 2012, said the situation in Manitoba is so dire that he and others are calling for an immediate halt to construction of the Keeyask dam, even though up to $4.5 billion in sunk costs have been incurred.

That compares to about $2 billion in sunk costs for Site C.

“This story isn’t going to end very well,” Lane, a retired chartered accountant, said in an interview. “It’s never too late to stop.”

Manitoba hydro customers now face compounding eight per cent rate increases each year for six years in a row as a result of over-spending on the Keeyask dam and related transmission lines.

Feds surprise B.C. by abstaining on Site C dam legal challenge

The German word schadenfreude immediately sprang to mind for Victoria lawyer Robert Janes when he heard the surprise news that the federal government will not contest an interim injunction application by a Treaty 8 First Nation seeking to halt work on the Site C dam.

Janes said there are many officials in Ottawa who believe the B.C. government is deliberately putting Ottawa in an untenable position on the Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion championed by Alberta and the federal government.

“That has probably not created a lot of willingness on the part of the federal government to bail B.C. out of the fight that B.C. has chosen to have with the Treaty 8 First Nations,” said Janes, a litigator with extensive experience representing First Nations.

“I’m sure there are many federal politicians and officials having the feeling of schadenfreude or, as the German say, happiness in the misery of others, as they look at B.C. in this situation. But that of course is purely speculative.”

The decision leaves the B.C. government to stand alone in court this July fighting West Moberly First Nations, which brought the injunction application pending a full civil trial that aims to terminate the Site C project on the grounds that it infringes on treaty rights.

The question of whether the Site C dam infringes on treaty rights has never been tested in the courts, and a favourable ruling for First Nations could shut down the entire Peace River hydro project.

Tim Thielmann, a lawyer for West Moberly First Nations and Prophet River First Nation, said Canada’s position appears to be unprecedented.

Thielmann said he is not aware of any other case in Canada in which a government has elected not to defend its own authorizations from being struck down by litigation brought by First Nations.

The Site C dam required multiple federal authorizations to proceed, including one permit that granted BC Hydro permission to cause “serious harm” to fish habitat.

“They [the federal government] say that they do not consent to the injunction,” Thielmann said in an interview. “But they do not oppose the injunction. What they say is they take no position. It’s the equivalent of abstaining on a vote.”

quote:

Contradictory positions from federal government

The federal move also shines a national spotlight on the B.C. government’s contradictory position towards First Nations, a position that Chief Roland Willson of West Moberly First Nations called “hypocrisy.”

“They’re playing hardball on Kinder Morgan,” Willson said in an interview. “They’re saying ‘let’s stop everything and let the courts decide,’ but here on Site C they’re just rolling ahead.”

“We’ve asked them numerous times to stop. That’s the part that’s hard to understand. They’re saying one thing for Kinder Morgan but totally saying the complete opposite on Site C. They’re speaking out of both sides of their mouth.”

Like the federal government, B.C.’s NDP government has pledged to advance reconciliation and to uphold the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which states that large resource projects such as the Site C dam must have the free, prior and informed consent of Indigenous peoples.

Site C Injunction Request Has Strong Argument But Poor Odds

The federal government made a splash in the Site C news cycle earlier this month when Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould announced it would not oppose an injunction application from two First Nations groups. It means the B.C. government and BC Hydro will go into the injunction hearing, scheduled for mid-summer, without the federal government on their side. It also removes a heavyweight influence in court.

“It’s significant that one of the governments, whose authorization stands to be struck down by this injunction, has decided that they will not oppose it,” said Tim Thielmann, general counsel for the nations, saying the courts tend to defer to the Crown’s position on understanding public interest.

Beyond that, it’s not clear the federal government’s absence will change anything. UBC Indigenous law professor Gordon Christie says it’s an interesting move that won’t amount to much.

“I think they’re trying to change the image they’re projecting, but they’re picking a situation that it doesn’t really seem to lead to a different outcome,” Christie said. “So it looks good for them, but they’re also probably well aware of the fact that B.C. will fight tooth and nail to have the dam construction continue, so they don’t have to do anything.”

quote:

The injunction application, filed in January, is related to two civil suits filed by West Moberly and Prophet River First Nations. The two nations argue that Site C and the combined effects of the two other dams on the Peace River are an unjustified infringement of Treaty 8 rights. Previous court challenges have been unable to address this question because they were judicial reviews, a streamlined process.

“Because work on the project is proceeding, it was necessary to bring an interim injunction to ask the court to suspend work on the dam so that the rights that we say are being infringed aren’t gone before the First Nations can have their day in court,” Thielmann said.

West Moberly is asking for a full stop of construction except for any preservation activities needed to maintain the site until the civil case is heard. Failing that, it’s asked for work to be stopped on 13 critical areas. It also requested an expedited trial date.

Most impacts from the dam are irrevocable; if the injunction fails, the infringed rights can’t be restored. The only recourse will be monetary.

“I suspect that the Treaty 8 nations have a reasonable chance at winning the infringement case, but what will that mean?” Christie said. “It will just mean they get some compensation. Taxpayers will be on the hook — and of course no government official is going to suffer at all from this. They’ll have the dam built, and the water will flood the valley, and the oil and gas industry will have their cheap power to continue their fracking operations up there.”

Site C is a broken BC NDP promise.

..site c is more than a broken promise it's a betrayal on a notley scale. the deliberately lies as there was never any intention to seriously consider stopping the dam's construction. included was all the crocodile tears shed by those ndp caucus members who spoke in public about the difficulty of the decision. 

..more from #16

quote:

Companies like Shell gain access to our fossil fuel resources when our government sells them “subsurface rights”. After those sales, companies may produce natural gas and other fossil fuels by drilling and fracking them from the ground. But once they do so, they must pay royalties on what they extract. Those royalties then help the provincial government pay for a very tiny portion of our health, education and other public service costs.

I say tiny because the public benefits derived from those royalties are dropping faster than a stone through water.

In fiscal year 2008, according to the “upstream development division” of BC’s Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources, British Columbians received $1.16 billion in royalty revenues. By 2017, however, revenues had fallen nearly 90 per cent to $147 million. Yet over that same time, natural gas production shot up 72 per cent and production of gas liquids such as condensate entered the stratosphere, climbing by 250 per cent. Virtually all of the increased output was piped east to Alberta’s oil sands industry.

Now, the government that provided those generous subsidies says the public is not entitled to know what individual companies pay in royalties.

Is our government afraid to let us know? You be the judge.

Every time Shell or its competitors drill deep or horizontal wells in BC – even though such wells are standard industry practice – our government grants them credits allowing them to claim back part of the costs of doing so. The credits translate into far lower royalty payments on the natural gas and gas liquids those companies produce.

In each of the last 10 years, Shell and others used those credits to reduce their royalties by a massive amount. In the last six years in particular, the write-downs were never less than 60 per cent and as high as 73 per cent. What this means is that collectively over the past decade British Columbians lost nearly $5 billion in additional royalty revenues.

And the subsidy train has only just pulled out of the station.

In a startling disclosure last November, BC Energy Minister Michelle Mungall said the current value of outstanding credits is $3.2 billion – a whopping $1.1 billion more than the previous year. That eyebrow-raising jump in the credit account is two times greater than the previous record for an annual increase. Yet when asked to elaborate on the unprecedented increase, Mungall’s communication’s director, David Haslam, declined to provide any concrete explanation.

..a healthy side of bc hydro.

Skidegate on the way to becoming a "city of the future"

HlGaagilda (Skidegate) is on the way to becoming a city of the future. In a genuine effort to decrease diesel consumption, heat pumps have been installed in almost all of 350 homes and solar panels installed on all major buildings.

quote:

The band ordered so many heat pumps that the installer, Fujitsu Canada, sent a representative to the island to find out what was going on. The Fujitsu team was inspired by what they learned and gave the band reduced pricing for everyone who was interested in buying a pump. They also fit the George Brown Recreation Centre and community hall with heat pumps for free, Yovanovich explained.

"The money saved is both a big and small part of it," Stevens said. "Our main concern is for Mother Earth."

Heat pumps will be saving people about $100/month, which works out to over $400,000/year. This affects both Skidegate and the surrounding communities. Heat pumps improve air quality and circulation throughout the home or building, reduce mold and are cost efficient.

Stevens pointed to the heat pump above her head in the office, as it opened and closed in silence, working away to regulate the temperature of the room.

Working with B.C. Hydro, the band has started to install energy efficient upgrades in every home. Through the Energy Assistance Conservation Program, B.C. Hydro has changed light-bulbs to LED lighting, put pipe wrapping on hot water pipes, and draft-proofed windows and doors in many homes. Moraes said they bring B.C. Hydro members to the community to run workshops and give presentations that provide training and education for the community, building capacity and help the community to take even more meaningful steps towards energy self-dependence.

"We have a healthy relationship with B.C. Hydro," Moraes said, and the others agreed. "We have been collaborating with B.C. Hydro for over ten years and through them, piloted programs on-reserve, to become more sustainable."

The band council is currently working on building a small office for B.C. Hydro on the reserve. Media relations representative of B.C. Hydro, Susie Rieder said in an email that the heatpump project they helped fund is expected to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 570 tonnes a year. That's the equivalent of saving 750,000 kWh annually- enough to power 68 homes.

"We provided the band with over $250,000 in rebates to fund this project through our Home Rennovation Rebate Offer, where homeowners can receive rebates for a variety of energy-efficient upgrades," Rieder explained. "The Band also participates in our Net Metering program – designed for customers who want to generate electricity for their own use and to offset their load."

Peace Valley residents hold out hope for Site C dam injunction as eviction day looms

It was not a happy week for BC Hydro’s Site C dam project in northeast B.C.

First, the Alaska Highway News revealed that WorkSafeBC had slapped the project’s largest contractor, whose relationship with BC Hydro is already fraught with conflict, with a $310,000 fine for exposing workers to dangerous silica dust that can cause irreversible lung disease and cancer.

Then the same paper disclosed that BC Hydro has been hit with an order from B.C.’s environmental assessment office to control runoff water, soil erosion and sediment on the dam construction site — after BC Hydro failed to comply with a previous order to put a plan into place.

So what on earth is happening with the Site C project these days, especially since it has prematurely (and conveniently, for the NDP government) vanished from the shrinking story list of most provincial news outlets?

“A gong show,” is how Peace Valley farmer Ken Boon recently described the over-budget project, as he surveyed the construction site from a neighbour’s farm high above the Peace River.

“Most of what we’re watching right now is not building a dam,” Boon told The Narwhal.

“It’s mitigating the problems of this particular site. What they’ve been doing since 2015 is taking down the northern slope [of a Peace River bank] to make it stable enough to build a dam.”

Construction of the dam structure has not begun, with more than $2 billion of the project budget spent.

quote:

The farmers’ lookout, accessed through private fields, is the place where local residents go with binoculars to try to scope out what is really happening on the project, which the B.C. government removed from independent scrutiny after a fall review exposed serious geotechnical issues and revealed the final price tag could top $12.5 billion.

The NDP government has chosen not to restore the watchdog B.C. Utilities Commission with independent oversight of the Site C project — ensuring ready access to information for the public —  opting instead for a secretive “Site C Project Assurance” board whose findings have not been disclosed.

quote:

If the First Nations lose their application for an injunction to stop work on Site C until the case can be decided, Boon, whose family can be removed from their third-generation home by BC Hydro with two months’ notice, says it will likely be open season on the valley and its residents.

“If this injunction is not granted in midsummer, probably once the bird window is off and they’re permitted to start logging again, I imagine we could be seeing a lot more logging and activity taking place elsewhere in the valley at that time.”

Boon said valley residents are still finding the NDP government’s December decision to proceed with the project “tough.”

“People are still having a hard time dealing with that.”

“Obviously there’s great hope that an injunction or something will come along that will stop this project yet.”

Site C dam facing ‘extremely high probability’ of major construction delay: expert witness

BC Hydro’s troubled Site C dam project, already behind schedule and vastly over-budget, faces an “extremely high probability” of at least a one-year construction delay, according to a leading expert in large hydro dam projects.  

Harvey Elwin, an expert witness in a First Nations application for an injunction to halt work on the Peace River dam, makes the statement and other revelations in a lengthy report filed late Wednesday in B.C. Supreme Court. 

The report’s significant findings contradict recent public assurances from BC Hydro and B.C. Energy Minister Michelle Mungall that the $10.7 billion project is on track, implying that costs are likely to soar further.

“Traditionally, there are major risks in dam and hydroelectric projects, especially when they have complex and challenging geology and foundations like the Site C Project,” notes Elwin’s 196-page report.

Elwin, who has held major leadership roles with large multinationals working on hydroelectric projects around the world, based his report in part on confidential BC Hydro documents released on condition that some information about the Site C project not be disclosed outside the courtroom. Sections of the report are accordingly redacted.

In an affidavit filed earlier as part of his expert testimony, Elwin describes the high level of confidentiality surrounding the Site C project as “extraordinary” and says he has never encountered such secrecy during his five decades designing, developing and managing large hydroelectric projects, including during his work on China’s Three Gorges dam, the world’s largest hydro facility....

Site C dam secrecy ‘extraordinary’, international hydro construction expert tells court proceeding

An international hydro dam construction expert describes the high level of confidentiality surrounding B.C.’s Site C hydro project as “extraordinary” and says he has never encountered such secrecy during his five decades designing, developing and managing large hydroelectric projects, including China’s Three Gorges dam.

“I have never seen in 50 years a major public project or program being put in place for its ratepayers by a public agency providing as little information,” Harvey Elwin, a civil engineer who has held major leadership roles with large multinationals working on hydroelectric projects around the world, states in an affidavit filed in B.C. Supreme Court.

quote:

But information on the status of Site C project schedules, actual costs versus planned costs, the progress of work by percent complete, and technical board reports should not be commercially sensitive “and have been routinely reported to the public on many other projects being constructed,” Elwin says.

Withholding “virtually all the cost, schedule, and progress information from the public and the public oversight bodies” such as the independent B.C. Utilities Commission (BCUC) are “far from the norm and contrary to policies I am used to seeing elsewhere for major world class public infrastructure projects,” the affidavit states.

“It is my opinion that it is very unusual and in conflict with the responsibility of project management and public sector officials not to keep their constituents and ratepayers informed specifically on the progress for public sector projects being performed by a public sector agency,” Elwin says in the affidavit.

“This is particularly true for a project that, in the first three years of a nine year construction duration, already has a year delay to [river] diversion and a 22 per cent budget overrun.” 

..finally

quote:

The B.C. NDP government has said electricity from the Site C dam will be sold for less than it costs to produce, leaving BC Hydro customers to make up the difference.

Arguments in Site C dam court case represent ‘cynical denial’ of Indigenous rights: B.C. Indian Chiefs

The Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs has taken the unusual step of writing an open letter to Premier John Horgan denouncing legal arguments made last week by BC Hydro as a form of “neo-colonization” and demanding a formal apology from the provincial government.

BC Hydro’s lawyers made the arguments during ongoing B.C. Supreme Court hearings for an injunction application by West Moberly First Nations to halt work on the Site C dam on B.C.’s Peace River, pending a full civil trial to determine if the $10.7 billion project violates treaty rights.

“We call on you to publicly denounce these statements that diminish Indigenous rights in an open letter to the B.C. Supreme Court, and to apologize formally for the disrespect shown to the Treaty 8 First Nations,” said the letter, signed by Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs (UBCIC), as well as vice-president Chief Robert Chamberlin and secretary treasurer Judy Wilson.

“We call on you to publicly denounce these statements that diminish Indigenous rights in an open letter to the B.C. Supreme Court, and to apologize formally for the disrespect shown to the Treaty 8 First Nations,” said the letter, signed by Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs (UBCIC), as well as vice-president Chief Robert Chamberlin and secretary treasurer Judy Wilson.

The UBCIC executive told Horgan and Eby there can be no lasting reconciliation while the rights of Indigenous peoples “are being trampled upon, diminished, and frozen in the past.”

“There can be no trust in your government while the words you say to the public ring false in the courtrooms where Crown corporation lawyers perpetuate neo-colonization.”

As an example of BC Hydro legal arguments the UBCIC said were “consistently diminishing the rights of First Nations,” the letter pointed to BC Hydro’s claim in court that Treaty 8 was never intended to protect First Nations “practical, traditional, cultural, or spiritual connection to any land.”

“This is an arbitrary, one-sided interpretation of the Treaty that runs contrary to the principles of Treaty interpretation already recognized by the courts, and contrary to the spirit of reconciliation,” wrote the executive.

Amnesty International spokesperson Craig Benjamin called the letter “a bit of a bombshell” and said as far as he knows it is unprecedented.

“I have never seen anything like it, to be honest,” he told The Narwhal.

“What really strikes me is they’re not just denouncing the negative and inappropriate arguments used by [BC] Hydro. They’re actually saying, ‘Look Premier Horgan and Attorney General Eby, you have a responsibility now. You have to correct the record. You have to apologize for the insult to Indigenous culture and history and you have to set the record right on how the province understands the rights of Indigenous Peoples.’ ”

quote:

Horgan’s office, when contacted for comment, referred questions to Eby’s office because the premier is out of town. Eby’s office said it could not respond by the time of publication.

Retired BC Hydro engineer calls for independent safety review of Site C dam

Calls for an independent safety review of the Site C dam project are mounting following a large landslide near the project’s worksite that has blocked the only road to a small community and led to the evacuation of residents by boat.

Retired BC Hydro engineer Vern Ruskin said this week’s mushrooming slide is a reminder that the project is located in an area prone to landslides and that a major landslide close to the Site C dam structure could compromise it.

“If the landslide is a long way off and all they get is a wave then the dam can withstand it,” Ruskin told The Narwhal. “If the landslide is close enough it could damage the dam structure and it may fail.”

Ruskin, who directed the team that designed the five dams originally planned for the Peace River, including Site C, said he has repeatedly asked the B.C. government and BC Hydro to conduct an independent safety review of the project due to its location in a valley with a history of large landslides and because of a change to the design of the dam structure.

When former B.C. premier Gordon Campbell announced his government would proceed with the Site C project in 2010, the dam structure was depicted as a very slight arc. But in 2014 an L-shaped structure — which Ruskin says to the best of his knowledge has never been used anywhere in the world for an earthen dam — was revealed when former premier Christy Clark announced final approval of the project.

quote:

Dam safety under fire around world

Announced in 2010 as a $6.6 billion project and given final government approval in 2014 as an $8.8 billion project, the Site C dam’s price tag climbed by an additional $2 billion late last year.

Dam safety practice around the world “has been shaken” by the recent collapse of tailings pond dams at B.C.’s Mount Polley mine and in Brazil, the Site C project’s technical advisory board noted in its February meeting minutes. The board, charged with providing technical reviews and engineering advice, also noted the 2017 failure of California’s Oroville dam spillways following heavy rains, which led to the evacuation of more than 180,000 people downstream.

‘Be prepared to be surprised’: What’s next for the Site C dam?

Treaty 8 First Nations are bracing themselves for the impending destruction of traditional hunting grounds and other areas of special cultural significance following last week’s denial of an injunction application to stop work on the Site C dam on B.C.’s Peace River.  

BC Hydro has said 13 areas of cultural importance for the Dunne-Za nations — including prime moose habitat, a rare old-growth white spruce and trembling aspen forest and two wetlands called Sucker Lake and Trappers Lake — will be clear cut and bulldozed as early as the beginning of November.

“It’s cultural genocide,” said Roland Willson, chief of West Moberly First Nations. “Our culture is being on the land. We’re people of the land and without the land we are no longer Dunne-Za people.”

Willson told the Narwhal that “everyone’s depressed, they’re sad,” following the B.C. Supreme Court decision.

quote:

Courts almost always give economic issues greater weight than Indigenous rights or environmental issues, according to Indigenous law expert John Borrows, who told The Narwhal in January that the “deck is stacked against First Nations” in injunction hearings.

“I think this is just an illustration of that pattern repeating itself,” Borrows said Monday in an interview.

Site C treaty rights violation yet to be tested in court

The question of whether the Site C dam violates treaty rights has never been tested in the courts.

Normally a full civil trial would not be heard for at least three to six years, but Milman ordered that the full civil trial be concluded by 2023. That’s the earliest the Site C reservoir would inundate 83 kilometres of the Peace River Valley and 45 kilometres of tributary valleys with up to 50 metres of water.

Milman’s order raises the possibility that the project — whose cost has jumped from $6.6 billion to $7.9 billion to $8.8 billion to last December’s price tag of $10.7 billion — could be halted at the eleventh hour, leaving BC Hydro with a stranded asset.

“The TMX (Trans Mountain pipeline) decision showed even though the federal government had invested $5 billion into backing the project, money alone is not sufficient to override constitutionally protected rights — in this case, the constitutionally protected treaty rights of First Nations,” said Tim Thielmann of Sage Legal, the firm representing the First Nations.

“It’s clearly disappointing that the courts wouldn’t stop the work now,” Thielmann told The Narwhal, noting that the judge has “at least preserved the possibility of a permanent injunction.”

Borrows, a Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Law at UVic’s law school, also pointed to the Trans Mountain pipeline decision, noting that substantial amounts of public money could be spent on the Site C project and “you might not be able to proceed with the development.”

United Nations instructs Canada to suspend Site C dam construction over Indigenous rights violations

In a rare rebuke, the United Nations has instructed Canada to suspend construction of the Site C dam on B.C.’s Peace River until the project obtains the “free, prior and informed consent” of Indigenous peoples.

Canada has until April 8 to report back to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination outlining steps it has taken to halt construction of the hydro project, which would flood 128 kilometres of the Peace River and its tributaries in the heart of Treaty 8 traditional territory.

The unusual request from one of the world’s top human rights bodies was made by committee chair Noureddine Amir in a December 14 letter to Canada’s UN Ambassador Rosemary McCarney.

It comes as Canada vies for a coveted seat on the UN Security Council and two Treaty 8 First Nations await a court date to determine if the Site C project unjustifiably infringes on their constitutionally protected treaty rights, as they claim in civil actions filed last January.

“The Committee is concerned about the alleged lack of measures taken to ensure the right to consultation and free, prior and informed consent with regard to the Site C dam, considering its impact on indigenous peoples’ control and use of their lands and natural resources,” wrote Amir, an Algerian law professor and former diplomat.

“The Committee is further concerned that the realization of the Site C dam without free, prior and informed consent, would permanently affects the land rights of affected indigenous peoples in the Province of British Columbia. Accordingly, it would infringe indigenous peoples’ rights protected under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.”

Canada missed an August 2018 deadline to report back to the committee on the Site C project, which was approved by the federal government in 2014 and green-lighted by B.C.’s new NDP government in December 2017.

Amnesty International spokesperson Craig Benjamin told The Narwhal that the federal and B.C. governments “misinterpreted” the UN committee’s 2017 recommendation that work on the Site C project be suspended, pending a full review in collaboration with Indigenous peoples that includes identifying alternatives to the irreversible destruction of Indigenous lands....

BC Hydro in court to keep Site C expenditure details from public

BC Hydro has gone to court to avoid revealing the names of public employees who decide which companies are awarded lucrative Site C project contracts during construction of the $10.7 billion hydro dam.

B.C.’s Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner (OIPC) ordered BC Hydro to release the information after Vancouver freelance journalist Bob Mackin, who publishes The Breaker News, lodged a complaint about missing data in Freedom of Information responses and the OIPC conducted an inquiry.

“We’ve got a right to know who is being paid to build and operate and make decisions on any public project or any public office,” Mackin told The Narwhal. “There’s no reason why we can’t have it.”

Mackin said journalists and the public must be able to verify that people making decisions about Site C project contracts are free of conflicts of interest and that they are “not awarding contracts to friends or co-workers, or people they’ve worked with before or companies that they might hold shares in.”

“While their identities are shielded…the conclusion of the public would be ‘maybe there’s something going on behind the scenes,’” he said. “We really need to know that this project is being done in the best fashion. Let us see that this is being done properly.”

BC Hydro’s legal challenge — filed January 18 in BC Supreme Court — comes as the B.C. Legislature expense scandal ignites calls for increased transparency and accountability in government operations.

The Site C dam on the Peace River in northeast B.C. is the largest publicly-funded infrastructure project in B.C.’s history.

B.C. under ‘enormous pressure’ to cancel Site C dam: First Nations chief

West Moberly First Nations are not backing down from their long battle to stop the Site C dam following Tuesday’s announcement that they will engage in confidential discussions with BC Hydro and the provincial government, says Chief Roland Willson.

“Our position is that the dam should not go ahead,” Willson told The Narwhal. “We think there’s still an opportunity to kill the thing before they flood the [Peace River] valley.”

The B.C. government said in a press release that the discussions will “seek alternatives to litigation related to the Site C dam project.”

“We’re listening to what they have to say,” Willson said. “There may be an alternative [to Site C]. In the discussion we’re going to be talking about how they don’t have to destroy the valley. Our primary focus is going to be about trying to protect the valley.”

The West Moberly and Prophet River First Nations filed civil claims in January 2018 alleging the Site C dam and two previous dams on the Peace River unjustifiably infringe on their treaty rights.

The nations subsequently lost their application for an injunction to protect 13 areas of cultural importance for the Dunne-Za nations — including prime moose habitat, a rare old-growth white spruce and trembling aspen forest and two wetlands called Sucker Lake and Trappers Lake — from clear-cut logging for Site C.

But the judge ruled their treaty rights case must be heard by 2023, prior to Site C reservoir filling scheduled for 2024.

Willson said the provincial government is under “enormous pressure from all over the place” to cancel Site C, which would flood 128 kilometres of the Peace River and its tributaries in the heart of Treaty 8 traditional territory, poisoning bull trout and other fish with methylmercury.

He pointed to a United Nations request that Canada suspend Site C dam construction until the project obtains the “free, prior and informed consent” of Indigenous peoples. Canada has until April 8 to report back to the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination outlining the steps it has taken to halt construction of the $10.7 billion dam.

Willson also highlighted a January study from the C.D. Howe Institute that concludes BC Hydro customers will be better off if the Site C dam is cancelled immediately, as well as the provincial government’s report on the first phase of a comprehensive review of BC Hydro, released in mid-February, which found B.C. has too much energy.

“There’s an abundance of power and we don’t need Site C,” said Willson, who has called the Site C dam “cultural genocide.”....

..as if the key is being connected to the health officers.

Horgan says work at Site C will continue unless Dr. Henry says to stop

While key work proceeds at the Site C dam project, Premier John Horgan says it will continue “until Dr. Bonnie Henry tells us otherwise.”

Horgan was reacting this week to public calls for suspension of the multibillion-dollar project to minimize risk to workers and the community during the novel coronavirus outbreak.

“I have heard the concerns of people in the north. I also listened to advice and direction we have been getting from public health officials, particularly Dr. Henry,” Horgan told reporters.

“We are confident that the measures that have been put in place by B.C. Hydro to protect workers, to protect the community, are appropriate at this time. And until Dr. Henry tells us otherwise, we are going to carry on.”

Dr. Henry, the provincial health officer, recently issued precautionary guidelines for large industrial work sites like Site C. WorkSafeBC has also issued guidelines.

Calls to put construction on hold have come from First Nations leaders in the region and from members of city council in Fort St. John, the community nearest the site and downriver from the dam.

In an open letter to Dr. Henry recently, the retired chief medical health officer for Northern Health, Dr. David Bowering, called for a shutdown of large industrial work camps like Site C, branding them “incubators” for the virus.

But Dr. Henry rejected the call and took a rare shot at the retiree: “It’s unfortunate that he’s not as connected with the Northern Health medical health officers as he was in the past.”....

In an open letter to Dr. Henry recently, the retired chief medical health officer for Northern Health, Dr. David Bowering, called for a shutdown of large industrial work camps like Site C, branding them “incubators” for the virus.

..this is not an armchair quarter back. neither are the indigenous folk nor the fort st john council members. you just like to sling shit north report..at folks who don't agree with the ndp.

..of course she said such a thing. she's has a medical position that is all wrapped up in politics. and you blindly disconnect it from the politics of site c. your not asking whether or not henry and the others have a point..your blindly defending the ndp. 

..allowing man camps to happen boggles the mind and common sense. there are no facilities to contain or treat the virus once it gets out in the north. into the indigenous community. are we not learning anything?  just allowing it is already to late. they are creating sacrifice zones.

..time and again we place trust in governments. wanting to believe they aren't fucking us over in the most cruel and outrageous ways. time and again we are disappointed. time and again we think next time they will have learned their lessons and have changed.

..well here we have 150 yrs to draw on. here we have 150 years of indigenous repression in some of the most despicable ways on the planet. have we forgotten the invasion that recently took place? where governments were forced to the table to talk with the rightful authority? have we forgotten site c is moving forward without the consent of indigenous folk..the rightful authority over that territory?

..it's sad north report..to see you hide behind the doctor..instead of acknowledging 150 years of repressive politics that continues to this day.

..are those in the piece i posted not bc'ers