Talk:BC Hydro

Accenture

Why is there no mention of the transfer of BC Hydro employees to Accenture in 2003/2004? 66.183.177.40 (talk) 08:21, 27 February 2008 (UTC)Sandy Cofield

Citations

I've tagged the article as unreferenced and in need of citations, as there are a number of statistics quoted in the article that should be properly sourced. I've added to my task list to pitch in. If anyone else can as well, please do! pbryan 07:59, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Added them today.--Keefer4 03:03, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! pbryan 03:54, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

the early history is vague as it is complex. Victoria had its gas plant going back to 1862. Moodyville had a very early electric light plant dating to 1880. And the Vernon and Nelson Electric company built the first real dam at Brilliant in 1898; all were not BC Hydro, or BCER projects.this has beem left out for clarity. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.76.183 (talk) 14:45, 5 July 2008 (UTC)

Why are you going to delete the BC E totem? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.81.76.183 (talk) 03:03, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

Seems like p.r. department staffers have been "improving" the article by getting rid of stuff that's (they think) best swept into hte dustbin. But in actually the BCE Totem was not Hydro's logo, but that of the British Columbia Electric Company, which was the power-generation subsidiary of the BC Electric Railway Co., and which should have a separate article anyway.Skookum1 (talk) 17:24, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Half-truths and avoiding truth

Aside from noting that the article is rife with company usages, e..g "penstocks for power" in one photo caption, which I changed to non-slogan English, there's huge amounts of political history and financial politics that the article doesn't go anywhere near. This includes Accenture's role in teh company nowadays, which curiously enoygh isn't mentioned at all; actually if you're from BC it's not curious at all, we're quite used to cover-ups and deflections. Powerex is mentioned, but not the politicis of its emergence; the downstreeam benefits sold off by the NDP are also not mentioned, just to show I'm non-partisan about this; limitations on Hydro's activities and the ownership of its transmission-system out-of-province are big -time current politics. This article is in serious need of repair/expansion and also in need of being patrolled for oompany friendly/COI edits from very evident activities by p.r. dept starffers and/or the Public Affairs Bureau (British Columbia), which is the current Liberal regime's propaganda/-cum-media-monitoring department....among the things missing are the mention that Paul Nettleton was driven from the government caucus (or did he resign? I've forgotten) because of a letter he wrote his fellow caucus members about the privitization-of-BC-Hydro then underway (2004. Likewise Patrick Kinsella's role in the privatization and in the promotion or run-of-the-river IPPs, and the migration of Hydro staffers to those same IPPs......lots of historical politics missing too....Skookum1 (talk) 17:22, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Accenture

Accenture, mentioned in the previous section, is now in charge of the company's administrative divisions and that should be in this article by now; I don't know the exact particulars so can't add it....but IIRC it was Accenture's fault re the power gouging in California (ironic given Accenture's relationship with Enron).Skookum1 (talk) 17:30, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Major Revision

I've now edited most of this article, including rewriting parts, adding missing information, removing statements which appeared to be unsubstantiated opinion and not referenced, or information not specifically relevant to the article given its size and scope. I also re-arranged the images to fit better with the content and updated the statistics in the first section based on the 2009 Annual Report. User:JamCad605 2009 October 16

that's all fine and dandy, except that self-referential citations are not "reliable sources" in the wikipedia sense; not that Annual Reports aren't valid sources, just that third-party references are needed to take away the hint of COI/AUTU/press release that hangs over this article. There are only a few non-promotional items/references here, most added by me I'll admit; other coverage of BC Hydro's activities is needed, though I'll grant that things like generating capacity and such are best referenced through the company's own data, either that or the BCUC or other official sources/bodies.Skookum1 (talk) 18:25, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

the politics of IPPs missing

Re this:

The BC Hydro Public Power Legacy and Heritage Contract Act, while recognizing the value of low cost electricity produced by BC Hydro's existing "heritage assets," requires BC Hydro to meet the province's future needs for additional power through private developers and operators. These acts in conjunction with the government’s 2002 BC Energy Plan allowed for Independent Power Producers (IPPs) to sell intermittently available power from typically small scale run of the river projects to BC Hydro.

I don't have time to assemble the many cites about the complex political controversies surrounding this act and its upshot, but I'll be back with some; the passage as it stands right now is so sanitized it makes it sound like this was innocuous; in actuality it will wind up bankrupting BC Hydro because of the rate the company is forced to buy power from these producers, and it will be for power generated at a time of year when such power is necessarily for export only, not for domestic consumption as the claim "to meet the province's future needs" hopes to imply; hte largest of these, Plutonic, is a subsidiary/part of the investment portfolio of General Electric, even though it is a Canadian registered company and can claim to be Canadian in nature; that the boards of these IPPs are stacked with former ministry and govt agency apparatchiks and Liberal Party members/supporters who took part in the creation of the policy enabling these IPPs, and who know have sinecures on their boards, is also of issue. Some projects, like Plutonic's at Bute Inlet (which are actually on the Homathko River), are scarcely "small scale" as their holding ponds (diversion "bays") will be larger than many existing reservoirs made by ordinary dams (Whatshan, Alouette, Wahleach, Clowhom, Daisy Lake, Hayward/Ruskin, and others). The powerlines necessary to bring the power from remote, presently pristine areas, will also be massive undertakings and are not "small scale", though that term crops up and up in IPP press releases and in the government's propaganda. The implications under NAFTA of granting water rights to American companies is also of issue.... That's not the only POV issue here, I'll be back later....much of the history is similarly soft-soaped, and the importance of BC Hydro's revenues to the government's coffers has not been fully addressed, nor the long history of politics surrounding the corporation in general.Skookum1 (talk) 17:05, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Re: the politics of IPPs

I agree, it does sound somewhat sanitized, but it's also obvious that this article had became a little too political. I've revised the part on IPPs and added some information and two citations on Plutonic, GE and Toba and Bute Inlets. User:JamCad605 2009 October 17, 14:11

I just had a look at the older version of the article, before you rewrote it - which parts were "too political". I should advise you that standard practice in Wikipedia is not to delete information, but to cite it, and augment it. Given the decades of politics surrounding BC Hydro and its various projects, the older version didn't have really all that much in it at all. So please explain what you mean by "a little too political". And give some thought to the reality that a crown corporation that was spawned as a political gambit and which has been a political football, and its projects politically controversial - how can an article about it not have any politics?. The thing to do with information from one side of the fence or the other is to cite it as opinion, not to delete it. But again, I don't find what you found objectionable, please explain....Skookum1 (talk) 20:23, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

If you were meaning that the part on IPPs was "a little too political", it was barely present at all. And the same argument as above applies; how can dexcription a policy spawned by a political agenda, and which is the subject of political controversy, not have any political content???Skookum1 (talk) 20:24, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

What does need to be included is mention of the criticisms of the IPP projects put forward by opposed authors/organizations; there are scads of these to be found, but here's a few which belong both here and on the Plutonic article, and in regard to Liberal insiders and former govt bureaucrats sitting on its board, also with Naikun:

• Hey Gordo, what's going on here, The Tyee, April 13, 2009, Rafe Mair
• BC Hydro's Amazingly Bad Deal for Taxpayers, The Tyee, October 30, 2006, John Calvert (head of the BCUC, or on its board)
• The Ruinous Illogic of Private River Power, Aug 10, 2009, Rafe Mair

I'm looking for one article somewhere which lists all the Liberal insiders/govt high-ups who now sit on Plutonic's and Naikun's boards, and who were in on the creation of the policy in question; there are lots of other articles and websites than The Tyee, I'm just being lazy. More can no doubt be found on Citizens for Private Power and BC Guardians. Then there's this item, which is not about IPPs but definitely about a PPP:

• BC Hydro's $825 Dam Deal, Andrew MacLeod, The Tyee July 26, 2009

Thats' all recent politics, though, and much of it belongs on Plutonic's page and (again, when written) on Naikun's; older politics like the juggling of Hydro's books and it's one-time (still?) Triple-AAA credit rating and its political usages, and things like the Doukhobour bombings, all belong in this article in some way, however brief. Most of all the use of language which favours the projects as a "good thing" for the province is defintely POV, and to not question the political/financing/personnel links between the IPPs and the governing party is "POV by silence". NPOV does not mean that politics cannot be preseent; it means that it must be presented fairly and fully.Skookum1 (talk) 21:07, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Projects cancelled due to strong environmental opposition

I think you have be careful about saying a certain project was cancelled DUE TO strong enviromnetal opposition. There may have been strong opposition by environmentalist to a particular project, and it may have been cancelled, but that does not establish that the opposition was the reason the project was cancelled. JamCad605 (talk) 23:21, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, I lived through that particular era and followed the press coverage of it, in both the mainstream media and in what little independent media there was in those pre-web days, and I know it's the facts; the government's own position was probably something to do with feasibility studies, but the core issue with those was the environmental review of the project, which was deemed to not pass federal muster. First Nations politics then weren't what they are now, but since the mine-pit and power plant would be virtually on the doorstep of reserves of the Pavilion and Bonaparte bands, it's a given that their opposition would have also weighed in at the hearings had they ever been held. I'll try and source some press coverage or other material backing up what I said - and note that *I* added the cite template, as I'm aware if needs citation; I'll be writing the former editors of The New Catalyst, which was one publication "leading the charge" about Hat Creek, to see what copy/references they may be able to provide; if you can find other reasons why the project was cancelled, please do so. The Taseko-Chilko-Homathko and Stikine megaprojects were also shelved in the same era; there was less organized opposition to Taseko-Chilko-Homathko, partly because it got little play in the press; the Stikine, on the other hand, was the scene of concerted environmental opposition and most accounts, including those by writers/boosters in support of the projecct, state that it was blocked by envirnomental opposition (and is now Stikine River Provincial Park, as I recall).Skookum1 (talk) 20:31, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

engineering notes about BCEC etc projects

This material may be more suitable for a separate British Columbia Electric Company article, which I think is needed; its acquisitions like the Bridge River Power Development Company and the Stave Falls Power Company (I think I've got those names right) can be maybe redirects to it, with sections on them and their projects. Certain details about them do not belong here, and I'm at a loss to remember which historians I saw some of the bits in (years ago). One thing to note is that the development of Buntzen was a transplantation of "technology" from Scotland, in the form of Scottish engineers who recognized that inter-basin diversions could produce far more head than ordinary dams, as they had already done in Scotland, and this became a pattern in hydroelectric engineering in BC, so much so that even when a power plant was adjacent to a dam (as at Ruskin), the water flow was diverted through tunnels, rather than the powerhouse being part of or directly attached to the dam; in a sense Stave is a similar diversion as the course of the river was changed, rerouted through a "dry channel", with the old river-course the site only of the secondary Blind Slough Dam, immediately above the original Stave Falls (the falls, not the community); Alouette was one of these inter-basin diversions, as of course were Daisy Lake/Cheakamus and three of the four Bridge River plants...and Wahleach; Whatshan is similar but I'm not sure if that was West Kootenay Power & Light in conception. Another distinguishing factor of BCEC & associated plants is their use of NeoClassical architecture, though that's somewhat original research; in comparison to other forms/designs e.g. Jordan River on the Island is a shell dam, which is not the case with BCEC structures; other than Ruskin and the Stave Falls dams and Daisy Lake, most are earthfill, or as at Ruskin concrete poured in an earthfill-type structure. I haven't ever gotten to a proper writeup of the Stave Falls/Ruskin/Alouette develompent, and the Bridge River Power Project is as yet only cursory; Daisy Lake-Cheakamus needs doing, as does Clowhom and others....Skookum1 (talk) 15:04, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

This article is about BC Hydro, not IPPs

With this edit I removed promotional plugs for the NaiKun and Bear Mtn Wind Farms, which are not part of BC Hydro and are no more relevant to this article than any other of its customers/clients. There are over 100 IPPs underway in BC, and the only connection to BC Hydro is that the company is forced to buy power from them at triple the market rates; listing them in this article serves no purpose other than to promote their stock portfolios.....Skookum1 (talk) 15:04, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Powerex and import/export policy

The Powerex section currently mostly has information about the legal case with California, but there's more to it than that. I found this article in the The Tyee today, part of a series, which has a lot of information that could go in this article, but maybe a broader History of energy policy in British Columbia or Energy policy of British Columbia would allow more room than any BC Hydro-specific information that coul be included here (though Powerex is a BC Hydro subsidiary....or was when it was created, whatever boardroom musical chairs have been played since. The article gives a good summary of current controversies in energy import/export conditions:

BC Hydro's true power balance sheet

Johannson's holistic view isn't shared by the organization that she used to work for, though. BC Hydro remains steadfast in its assertion that the Site C Dam is a necessary addition to an electrical generation grid starved for new sources of production. The province, it has argued, has slipped from being a regular exporter of energy to becoming a habitual importer, a situation that can only be remedied by introducing a significant new source of power. "For much of the last decade, we have been a net importer of electricity, depending on other jurisdictions to supply between ten and 15 per cent of our electricity needs," BC Hydro's Site C informational website says. "By planning now, BC Hydro is working so that British Columbians will continue to enjoy the benefits of a secure, reliable and affordable electricity supply."

But BC Hydro's critics note that this is a deliberate misrepresentation of the state of energy consumption and distribution in British Columbia, as the crown corporation and the province are not interchangeable entities when it comes to power production. As University of British Columbia professors George Hoberg and Christopher Mallon noted in a 2009 paper, "BC Hydro electricity trade is not the same thing as BC electricity trade." Fortis BC, a private energy utility, operates in the Kootenays, and large industrial generators also provide power to the grid from Alcan's operations in Kitimat and Teck Cominco's in Trail. In 2008 these industrial producers contributed 20 per cent of the province's total electrical generation, and that figure has only fluctuated between 19 and 22 per cent over the last five years.

BC Hydro's claim that it has had to deal with a structural production deficit over the last decade is further complicated by the terms of British Columbia's Columbia River Treaty with the United States, which provides the province with "Canadian entitlements to downstream benefits." Because B.C. agreed to build dams on the Canadian portion of the Columbia River to assist the United States with flood control measures downstream, and because those dams also increase the amount of power the United States can get from their dams, the province receives an entitlement of approximately 1,200 MW, more than ten per cent of BC Hydro's total capacity of about 11,280 MW.

"While the U.S. officially delivers this power to B.C.," Hoberg and Mallon observe, "we don't take it as power to be used in the province. Instead, Powerex, the BC Hydro subsidiary that handles cross-border trades, sells it in the U.S. market, and B.C. gets revenue without ever importing the power."

In fact, Professors Hoberg and Mallon argue, British Columbia is almost always a net exporter of energy. Over the last 32 years, they note, there have only been five in which B.C. has brought more power into the province than it has sent out. And if the Canadian Entitlement from the Columbia Treaty were to be included in the calculations, the most recent five years that they studied would have been transformed from a 1.5 per cent deficit to a 5.1 per cent surplus. Given that BC Hydro believes that 72 per cent of future demand growth can be offset through conservation, the province could ensure energy self-sufficiency well into the future with only a nine per cent increase in new sources of electricity. "Including the downstream benefits of the Columbia River Treaty doesn't eliminate the forecasted gap in B.C. electricity supply," they write, "but it does narrow it."The Myth of a Power-starved BC Max Fawcett, 8 Apr 2010, The Tyee April 28, 2010

More of the same available re other Hydro issues from various BC sources; not only Hydro and BC govt sources should be used for this article, is my main point; those are "COI sources" and should be taken with a grain of salt and an eye for p.r. manipulation/obscurantism.Skookum1 (talk) 16:16, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

Deceptive information in many section

It's clear that Hydro's, and/or Accenture's p.r. people, have "washed" this article since I last looked at it; I'll have to review the history to see what's been taken out and what's been put in, but NOT mentioning the BCUC's emasculation recently because of its condemnation of both IPPs and Site C, and the fact that Hydro is forced by legislation to buy power from IPPs at three times the market rate, and so on, is a serious POV omission; that some of the only news sources for this are so-called blogs (indepedent journalists filling in where CanWest and CBC will not tread) doesn't make them unreliable sources; one of the cites I know I provided early, Rafe Mair's blog, is by an authoritative expert on the IPP controversy, i.e. Rafe himself (http://www.rafemaironline.com); if it was taken out because it's "only a blog", we might as well say the same about the non-coverage from the Sun and Province and CBC of these issues; Also citations from BC Hydro, Accenture and the like are COI, non-third-party citations and not all that "valid" nor are they all that reliable, being p.r. mechanisms only....Skookum1 (talk) 19:29, 23 October 2010 (UTC)

With all due respect, you've been ranting about this article for years. If you know how to straighten it up, then please rewrite the whole thing using the founding principles: WP:NPOV and WP:RS. Nobody will object. Thanks in advance. Bouchecl (talk) 03:40, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

Smart Meters

The edit by Skeptic Sceptic (talk) states that television use is detectable from the data transmitted, I find that highly unlikely and would like a reference to back it up. The only important privacy breach I can see is - the data patterns can indicate whether the home is occupied or not, wonderful information for burglars. And yes the information is protected by encryption, so no one needs to worry, it will be as safe as our computers.Dougmcdonell (talk) 17:00, 20 August 2014 (UTC)

needs smart meters

Inoticed that Hawk19 (talk) has removed 3000 characters from this page lately, including the whole topic of smart meters. This is an important topic in BC, it has cost a fortune and been in the news for years. Needs to be added back in. Dougmcdonell (talk) 15:12, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

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