I was first introduced to now-retired economist Erik Andersen by lawyer / commentator / broadcaster Rafe Mair. Using his professional experience, Erik analyzes several economic subjects. His recent comment about BC Hydro caught my attention.
Nobody seems to be noticing that the for-profit customers have been “free riding” on the credit worthiness of the domestic customers.
A example of this was the electricity generation plant proposed for Duke Point. The developers cleared their contract with BC Hydro and the BCUC, so it looked like a done deal until a few of us put pennies together to hire a lawyer, who made application and got approval to take the contract into a real court of law, something not similar to the BCUC, the regulator supposed to protect the public interest.
I think the clincher for us succeeding was a present value calculation for 25 years of income certainty that was $500 million, when the developer’s evidence was the cost to build was $300 million. That was a $200 million gift to the developer at the start for a transferable contract they could sell on day one.
Further to this evidence BC Hydro, the developer and BCUC vanished after finding out we had a court date. Not the end of the story though, greed is awake 24/7. To avoid the embarrassment again, Campbell made all following private power contracts secret. I know that because I tested that at the BCUC.
Predation has contaminated the crown corporation BC Hydro. It should have been kept as a “Natural Monopoly,” serving only residential customers, small businesses, and the industrial consumers in BC.
After playing the “combines game” with Enron, BC Hydro and the Government have used the public utility for political purposes, with the all-time star example being Site C.
With the unpredictable behavior of the US President we now have the elevated risk of Site C becoming an expensive stranded asset. You would have thought the government learned from coal contracts with the Japanese.1
Duke Point and several other gas-fired generators proposed for Vancouver Island would have been among the largest of energy schemes transferring public wealth to private hands. With guaranteed revenues, the projects would have been easily financed with little equity and almost zero risk. And as Erik said, they could have been flipped immediately.
Not only would BC citizens have been burdened with unnecessary costs, but massive quantities of greenhouse gas emissions would have resulted. As always, the pirates only cared about the rewards, not the impacts of their actions.
1 Almost two decades after it opened, British Columbia’s northeast coal project faced another year of lower export volumes at shrinking prices. An old-fashioned megaproject in trouble almost from the beginning, the project cost taxpayers about $1.6 billion. But before the first Japanese ore freighter loaded its first shipment at the Ridley Island terminal in January 1984, the steelmakers began demanding cuts in volume and price. — Source: South Peace Historical Society, ‘Northeast Coal Never Fulfilled Its Promise.’
Categories: BC Hydro
in-sights.ca 
Mr. Farrell,
Look at what those damned Scandinavians are up to now!
You take issue with BC Hydro?
Perhaps both you and Mr. Anderson are concerned that Hydro’s view of which innovative policy adjustments are required for this century are somewhat evasive if not Byzantine?
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5yx1rl8dk2o
“Gothenburg, Sweden’s second city, is highlighting its environmental credentials by continuing to put its money on the line.”
“Back in 2022, the City of Gothenburg, became what is believed to be the first local government in the world to take out a “sustainability linked loan” or SLL.
“This is a form of financing pegged to a set of annual environmental and social improvements agreed between a borrower and its banks.”
“Gothenburg’s four target areas are efforts to make renewable energy the sole source of the city’s heat production, making the council’s own vehicle fleet electric, reducing energy usage in municipality-owned buildings, such as hospitals and schools, and improving the city’s poorest neighbourhoods.”
“Meet agreed annual improvement levels in these sectors and, for each, Gothenburg gets a discount on the yearly fee it pays for the loan of 0.1% or around 100,000 kronor ($10,500; £8,000). But miss one of the targets by a certain amount and it has to pay a fine of the same amount.”
A good idea?
For sure, any day now BC Hydro (along a Big Bank not busy money laundering) plus BC Housing and a special group of BC Builders, will announce the very same plan.
It will be scheduled to appear very soon, after the launch of a very careful No Blame study.
Like the Cullen Commission.
Sound and rhetoric, signifying nothing.
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Thanks Norm for featuring BC Hydro and their role in the BC Economy.
BC Hydro has two classes of customers it reports sales for in GW hrs and CDN $s. In the “Domestic Residential ” group ( part of sales and revenues from BC only customers) had volume of sales in 2024 of 19,903 GW hrs that earned for BC Hydro CDN$106.91 per GW hr.
In the same report, sales to “Trade ” customers amounted to 20,983 GW Hrs and earned BC Hydro CDN $77.53 per unit.
Where these units of electricity were used in North America is not disclosed but for those interested, you can find the Quebec Hydro report of unit prices paid for electricity, by residential customers in large NA cities.
Second Pres. Bush brought into existence the North American Electricity Reliability Corporation (NERC) that embraced the USA, Mexico and Canada electricity producers, who all would participate at the wholesale level. PM Harper pressured all provinces to sign on to the agreement. NERC claims it is a non-profit corporation.
Now we come to interesting financial responsibility part, by customer category. Because BC Hydro is a Crown Corporation every citizen is therefor is an owner and is responsible for all its financial obligations. Other BC only customers are limited liability corporations which means they are not guarantors of BC Hydro financial obligations. The same non-accountability would apply to “Trade Customers”.
This all means the BC Hydro residential customers are carrying the total financial load while paying the highest price for their units of electricity ..
This is an American con-game as featured in books by John Perkins , author of “Confessions of an Economic Hitman” and others.
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Has there been an annual from BC Hydro?
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