Building a Vision for Green Energy in BC
Day 1 Overview
Points of Disagreement
  Environment assessment review process – flawed or
rigorous enuf?
  Private versus public power
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BC Hydro’s long term viability
Issues of transparency, accountability and
responsiveness
Belief that concerns related to private companies cannot
be adequately regulated (e..g social contracts)
Belief that the commercial sector has to be relied upon to
scale up green energy in any meaningful way
  What is Plan B?
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Day 1 Overview
Points of Agreement
  Climate change is a significant threat to civil society and
ecological services ;
  BC requires new, clean sources of electrical power to
meet anticipated demand ;
  Every power project has impacts and trade-offs
  BC would benefit from economic opportunities
associated with the alternative energy sector ;
  BC would benefit from open, transparent, and
participatory energy planning
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Day 1 Overview
Points of Agreement
  Better & earlier screening of potential green projects
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Proactive regional planning (greatest power potential
with least impacts) – e.g. hydro power projects
Cumulative impacts assessments  VEC centred rather
than project based
Improvements to the environmental assessment process
Increased role for BCUC
  Priorities
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GHG / Climate change
Ecosystem resiliency / Biodiversity
Local impacts
Low cost / economic development
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Day 1 Overview
Points of Agreement
  First Nations involvement and support is essential
  Requirement for broad public participation
  Clean (no net GHG) is not necessarily Green (socially
acceptable and ecologically compatible)
  Better science and a commitment to adaptive
management
  Better monitoring and enforcement
  Better access to information
  Phase out dependency on oil & gas = fuel switching
  We are lucky to be living in BC!
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Day 1 Overview
Challenge for Today
  What are concrete steps and outcomes from the
dialogue, given the degree of agreement from Day 1
discussions
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Building a Vision for Green Energy in BC
Greener Hydro Projects
Considerations:
make energy resource planning and environmental assessment
data freely and readily accessible ;
 engage with the scientific, industry, and NGO communities to
resolve areas in the province that are suitable for, sensitive to, and
restricted from alternative energy development on the basis of
acceptable local social impacts and maintenance of resilient
ecological services ;
 establish a cumulative impact assessment framework for the
evaluation of energy projects ;
 regulate, contract, license, and monitor energy contracts within a
single coordinated framework ;
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Greener Hydro Projects
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modernize the mandate of BCUC towards increasing overall
societal benefits while minimizing ecological degradation ;
phase in market pricing for electricity to decrease energy demand
and peak loads ;
include long-term monitoring costs within the economic rent for
water licences
license water rights such that they are forfeit if and when
associated developments do not meet established environmental
performance criteria
Etc....
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About the Dialogue
Guidelines for Dialogue
See program guide…
  Respect for people and time constraints
  Introduce yourself
  Strive to find good way to say difficult things
  Let there be humour
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About the Dialogue
Guiding Questions
  What are the opportunities for and challenges of developing
independent power production in BC?
  Are we on the right path?
  What is needed for better decision-making?
  Would a strategic plan help? And if so, what would it look
like?
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Building a Vision for Green Energy in BC