Glacier Creek. Photo by Colin Payne.
BC Hydro and AXOR, the company behind the Glacier/Howser power project, no longer have a power purchase agreement. Just what that means for the controversial hydroelectric generating project is unclear, but the Nelson-Creston MLA says it’s “great news.”
Michelle Mungall, MLA for the Nelson-Creston riding, says she heard the news after she received a copy of an email from a source. The email, sent by a BC Hydro employee, reads: “‘BC Hydro no longer has an electricity purchase agreement with AXOR for the Glacier/Howser project,’” says Mungall, reading directly from the email sent on Tuesday, Nov. 9, 2010.
“I can only speculate what it means, but for AXOR to lose its energy purchase agreement is a significant development in terms of whether they’ll go forward and whether the project continues to be viable for them.”
Mungall says the news that there’s no longer an energy agreement between Quebec-based AXOR and BC Hydro is “great news.”
“To me this is showing that AXOR might be pulling away from the Glacier-Howser project,” says Mungall. “Or that BC Hydro is recognizing that this is not a viable project for the people of British Columbia and the people of the Kootenay region.”
The third option Mungall sees is the two parties may renegotiate their agreement.
Simi Heer, a spokeswoman for BC Hydro, confirmed there is no longer a contract with AXOR to buy energy from the Glacier/Howser project. Heer would not elaborate, citing confidentiality agreements and “commercially sensitive information.”
Heer would not say whether it was BC Hydro or AXOR who cancelled the agreement.
Glacier/Howser project dogged by protest
Mungall has long been critical of the project that would divert water from Glacier and Howser Creeks (map) and generate 99.5 megawatts of power. Part of the project includes a 92 kilometre transmission line through the mountains.
The MLA organized a Nelson public meeting on the power project after the provincial Environmental Assessment Office (EAO) set public meetings on the project for Kaslo and Invermere in the summer of 2009. The Kaslo meeting drew over a thousand people, the majority of whom were against the project.
Impact on blue listed bull trout still a question
While the agreement between AXOR and BC Hydro has implications for the finances of the project, there are still questions around the environmental impacts of the Glacier/Howser project.
The assessment process was paused in September 2009 after the EAO asked AXOR for more information about how the project would affect bull trout, a species of fish on the provincial blue list, a list reserved for species at risk of extinction.
AXOR submitted its response to the EAO in August 2010 and the assessment office has been looking over the new documents since.
Answers from AXOR, province still to come
AXOR’s head office is in Montreal, Que. and due to the time difference, Simon Gourdeau, the project manager for AXOR, had left for the weekend and could not be reached for comment.
A call to the Environmental Assessment Office was not returned by the time this post was published.
More to come.
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BC Hydro has been campaigning themselves for over 20 years against purchasing Independent Power Power. Any doubt it was BC Hydro that cancelled?
“Power Power” should read Power Production:/
BC Hydro gets to move ahead on site C. Saving Glacier Howser is great, but will it cost us more of the Peace? Can’t we conserve? We need a new model for public utilities to recover costs – the current one is not working.
The water from the river flows into the Duncan reservoir and is held back by the Duncan Dam, which is a coffer dam and doesn’t generate power. It would seem to me that if you want power from the water from the Glacier/Hauser creeks, why not generate it at the existing dam.
I wonder if we will ever get a straight answer on what happened and think it is a little soon to jump for joy. I have no clue how the buying and selling of power works but know that a lot of other companies do it and wouldn’t be surprised to see one step up.
You raise a great point, Dan. Many of our dams were built for flood/flow control (Columbia River Treaty) with no power generation. Those that are being retrofitted are still not using all the water behind the dams for power. A lot still goes over the spillway. It seems rather wasteful considering the drainages are changed forever.
I suppose no one wants to spell it out, but revoking an EPA effectively kills the project. An EPA is a contract between the proponent and the hydro company that determines how much will be sold, when and for what price. Without a buyer for power, a proponent will not go forward with the project. Typically, EPA’s are used to leverage capital. When a proponent recieves one from BC Hydro it becomes easier to borrow money from the bank, or attract investors.
Unfortunately, there is no legislative system in place to remove the land and water tenure applications, they will remain on the books for a long time. At least the financials have fallen through…
To Clarify: The Glacier Howser Project EPA was cancelled by the proponent and not BC Hydro. From a financial or otherwise viewpoint there was no advantage in retaining a 2006 BC Hydro EPA for the GH Project.
I have interviewed Simon Gourdeau, AXOR’s project manager overseeing the Glacier/Howser project, who has confirmed @DUNCAN’s comment.
A new story will soon be up on the Nelson Post.
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