Site C

STOP SITE C NOW.

BRITISH COLUMBIANS DON’T NEED THE SITE C DAM.

We need jobs.
We need a healthy economy.
We need clean, green energy.
We need a modern, 21st century energy system

And that’s exactly why we don’t need the Site C dam.

  • BC doesn’t need the energy. We have a massive surplus—enough to switch every car in BC to an EV on our existing grid, which BC Hydro itself admits.
  • We don’t need to rely on hydro when other renewable energy options are cheaper—and keep getting cheaper.
  • We don’t need to spend $3.4 million per job when there are more sustainable, financially sound areas of employment.
  • We don’t need to undermine Indigenous treaty rights.
  • We don’t need to accelerate major carbon and methane outputs, which the dam will produce.
  • We don’t need to destroy rivers and ecosystems with a mega-dam when the cheaper renewable alternatives are far greener.
  • We can’t transition from fossil fuels to electricity if we make electricity needlessly expensive, as the Site C dam will do, and IPP contracts have already done as a foretaste. People only choose to switch if they can afford to. Site C actually retards the electrification of the economy.

And we don’t need to spend $12-20+ billion on this project when BC Hydro is already nearly $28 billion in debt ($70+ billion if IPP contracts over next period are included). We don’t need to double every BC resident’s hydro bills. We don’t need to saddle our children with debt that will take more than 70 years to pay off, leaving little left for schools, hospitals or our infrastructure.

On November 1, 2017 the British Columbia Utilities Commission (BCUC) released their independent report about the viability of the Site C dam. They were:

  • Not persuaded Site C will be delivered on time and on budget.
  • Skeptical of BC Hydro’s energy load forecast (which is understandable, given the company has consistently overestimated rates of demand by up to 30%).
  • Convinced that increasingly viable alternative energy sources such as wind, geothermal and industrial curtailment could provide similar benefits to ratepayers—with an equal or lower cost. That cost is now far lower than the cost of #SiteC, and dropping daily.

Continue to tell your MLA that this dam can still be stopped, especially now that very serious stability problems have shown up under all the initial construction at the dam, including under the spillways and generatirng station. Tell them to exit the the sunk cost fallacy, and that you don’t want your hydro rates to double for a project that will go over budget and under deliver. There are greener, cheaper energy sources British Columbians can use.

To truly support British Columbians—with energy, with jobs, with a sustainable future—terminate the Site C dam now. We deserve better.

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