When BC Liberals said the Site C completion budget was $7.9 billion, the cost of power from the project was stated to be $87 – $95 per megawatt-hour (MWh).

Now, with the Site C budget up 26% to $10.7 billion, John Horgan’s NDP government claims the cost per MWh has fallen 32% to $60.

Were the new project’s power costs calculated with methods long used in BC, the range, like the capital cost, would be up 26% to $110 – $120 per MWh.

The linked “Site C Technical Briefing” by Don Wright, Deputy Minister to the Premier, references “Alternative Portfolio assumptions” in page 21 bullet points but then fails to discuss the subject.

No wonder.

Last month, Forbes reported on a conference of the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), an organization with 150 member countries. It included this:

No where does Wright’s document assess the monetary value of lost farmland or the economic and cultural havoc that will alter lives of numerous First Nations people. A sad omission, which indicates NDP sympathies for UNDRIP may also be illusory.

Don Wright spent some time as President of the British Columbia Institute of Technology. Had any BCIT student produced a “technical briefing” as incomplete and inaccurate as the one by Mr. Wright, a failing mark would have been awarded.

What seems clear is that government has another agenda and they’re not sharing it with us. I noted a possibility in comments at the preceding In-Sights article:

I fear the NDP’s Kinder Morgan opposition is mere political theatre and reluctant surrender is planned for later.

A government that favours Site C – despite damage to the Peace River ecosystems, broken faith with First Nations, cheaper and cleaner alternatives, a dozen years of flat demand and export markets that have been unprofitable for years – has an unstated agenda.

That could be providing subsidized power to Kinder Morgan and to expanded gas production and liquefaction. They think this will allow them to say to Liberal supporters, “See, we’re the party of yes. We got an LNG plant done; you didn’t.”

The NDP aim is to be more than a one term government but they’ve miscalculated. They have lost and are losing their own supporters. Shutting down debate within the party will exacerbate the loss.

The Greens are applauding; they will be the beneficiaries.

BC Hydro – until debt do us part

by Reimar Kroecher and Eoin Finn

…It should be obvious that, when a company pays both for dividends and rising expenses by increasing its debt, and on top of that creates fictitious revenue it never received, year after year, that company is on a fast track to financial ruin…