As B.C. Hydro prepares to release its long-term energy strategy, a document suggests that the Crown utility is considering securing electricity from natural-gas-fired power plants. According to a presentation from a B.C. Hydro workshop held on April 25 at the Sutton Place Hotel in Vancouver, there is a 24.8 percent “relative likelihood” that three natural-gas-fired plants will be built: a 494-megawatt plant at Kelly Lake near Clinton scheduled in 2016; a 243-megawatt plant at the same location in 2024; and a 243-megawatt plant somewhere on Vancouver Island in 2025.

However, B.C. Hydro spokesperson Susan Danard told the Georgia Straight that no new electricity will be generated in natural-gas-fired plants in B.C. “In no way is B.C. Hydro even contemplating any new gas-fired generation,” she claimed. “That’s not us.”

These types of plants emit millions of tonnes of greenhouse gases, which have been linked to climate change. When asked if B.C. Hydro might buy electricity from independent power producers who burn natural gas, Danard replied, “I don’t believe that’s correct either because just today, actually, coincidentally we launched our clean call [for electricity from independent power producers].”¦That is the direction we’re going in”¦we’re looking at clean power projects: hydro, wind, solar, geothermal energy—proven technologies that have to meet the provincial guidelines for cleaner renewable energy. We’re not looking at purchasing or building gas-fired generation at this point.”

Julian Darley, president of the Post Carbon Institute, told the Straight he thinks B.C. Hydro shouldn’t consider this option because North American natural-gas supplies are on the decline and prices are rising. On June 11, prices were just below US$14 per thousand cubic feet—among the highest seen since hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. “It seems to be extraordinary hubris given what’s going on now,” he said in a phone interview from the institute’s office in Sebastopol, California.

Darley, a former Vancouver resident and author of High Noon for Natural Gas: The New Energy Crisis (Chelsea Green Publishing Company), told the Straight after his book was published in 2004 that the continent was on the verge of “a full-blown natural-gas crisis”. He maintains this view today, and rejects any suggestion that B.C. Hydro could offset continental shortages by importing liquefied natural gas from the Middle East or Russia. Darley added that anyone considering building a natural-gas-fired plant in North America is doing the equivalent of “taking a ride on a broken roller coaster”.

In the late 1990s, the NDP government proposed securing electricity from three natural-gas-fired power plants that would be built on Vancouver Island. The plan was opposed by business, environmental, and consumer groups. In 2003, shortly before the plan was cancelled, a B.C. Hydro consultant, Gordon Eng-
bloom, told the Straight that natural-gas prices would remain high through 2009. However, he predicted that prices would eventually fall because of technological innovation, the development of new basins, and the use of nonconventional sources such as coal-bed methane.

Danard said the Crown utility will submit its 2008 long-term acquisition plan to the British Columbia Utilities Commission on Thursday or Friday (June 12 or 13).

She added that B.C. Hydro planners working on the long-term acquisition plan must look at theoretical as well as practical options for securing electricity supplies. “When they go to the BCUC, they need to be able to show the ratepayers where we fit in the mix,” she said. “They’re looking at all the ranges of resource options in theory if we weren’t constrained by energy-plan policy or whatever. What are all the options? What are all the things we can consider?”

So for now, according to Danard, there will be no new natural-gas-fired generating plants in B.C. supplying the Crown utility—despite what one of the corporation’s own documents states.