Little Hawk
Active Member
Howdy,
Rafe forwarded me this today and I encourage anyone who gives a rat's-butt about BC's rivers and affordable electricity to take few minutes and read it. It's rebuttal to Vickers, and I.P.P. proponent. Please pass it on to all you know.
Campbell has to go! End of story...
Merry Christmas,
Terry Anderson
Mr Vickers -
You accuse me and those who feel as I do of spreading
untruths. After reading your article in the Campbell River paper I'm astonished that a man who gave no facts and confined himself to general attacks on unnamed people could make such an accusation. The nudge, nudge, wink, wink assertions that Save Our Rivers Society is funded by unions (untrue) set the stage for a frothy dissertation that contained not a single fact.
Do you deny that the developers are scarcely Mom and Pop operations but huge international organizations getting in on the 2008 equivalent of a gold rush?
These aren't nice ordinary BC folks with their small businesses but huge wealthy companies like General Electric with the Warren Buffett billions behind them masquerading as Plutonic Energy.
Do you deny that each of these licenses becomes a monopoly with no competition, not for the licensee itself or in the business? That this is a private monopoly system utterly bereft of any competition whatsoever so we're asked to give up our publicly owned monopoly where we get the profits to huge corporations which get all the money.
Do you deny that the profit from IPPS will all go to shareholders of these large companies and not into the BC Treasury where BC Hydro profits go? Surely you must understand that for a petty license fee and what amounts to peppercorn rent thereafter all the profits go not into our schools and hospitals but into the pockets of private shareholders?
Do you deny the environmental carnage that you can see with your own eyes if you go to www.saveourrivers.ca and look at the Powerplay series?
Do you deny that these projects will dam or divert rivers for up to 20 kms and will use up to 95% of the flow? How does the life within the river survive that? Do you deny that these "works" will have serious deleterious effects on fish, both resident and spawning?
Do you deny that once fish are removed or severely depleted the ecosystem dependant upon those depleted rivers is severely damaged? That the contained greenhouse gases thus escape?
Do you deny that these rivers must be reached by large gravel roads which are then permanent?
Do you deny that rights-of-way must be made, mostly by clearcutting, as long as100kms?
Do you not understand that these gravel roads and power lines have a serious adverse effect on wildlife? Or, perhaps, as with fish farms, you don't care?
Do you deny that IPPS have contracts forced upon BC Hydro by the government? Contracts that are indexed to the market?
Do you deny that Hydro will almost certainly be in a position where they cannot recover those sums on the market? They must buy high and sell low? Then, with this immense new obligation to IPPS and no transmission lines, still have to service a nearly $7 billion capital debt?
Do you not understand that the government's spokesman, Dr Mark Jaccard is paid by the government whereas Dr John Calvert and Dr Marvin Shaffer, those he criticizes, are independent? And that Dr Jaccard's Nobel Prize was shared with nine others and had nothing whatever to do with the issue of public or private power or the environmental concerns? And that his attack on Dr Calvert and Dr Shaffer has been thoroughly rebutted (a fact not mentioned by the former minister, now senator)?
Did you really say that BC Hydro couldn't afford to do these IPP projects? Good God, man, I'm a person of very limited assets but just let me have one of those licenses and I'll show within 24 hours how I'll finance it! If you said that, all else you have to say must take into account that you simply don't know what you're talking about but are just protecting the government you support.
Do you truly believe that the environmental assessment process is anywhere near adequate? This is a former Minister of Environment here. It has no power to stop or even change a project (the Pitt River project was stopped, temporarily, because its right-of-way went through a Provincial Park), may be waived by the government and its Director is not a public servant but a Gordon Campbell appointment.
Do you deny that BC Hydro's own statement shows that there is no need for this IPP power? Do you not know that by conservation, taking back our Columbia River Power, re-tooling some of our generators and adding new generators we can more than meet our needs? That this is by BC Hydro assessment in 2007?
Do you not agree that it's the duty of the government to prove our power needs and get some public consensus before taking these drastic, permanent "solutions". No case has been offered much less made and the consultation with the people has not happened.
Can you explain why the government has not even whispered about NAFTA and the problems these projects will cause? This may well be the most serious of all the consequences of this mad energy policy yet neither you, your ilk or the government dare deal with it! For shame!
Do you not understand that once we embark upon this adventure there's no turning back and that we will do to our environment what no American governor would dare do to his?
Do you not realize that you support tearing down the public power system that has served us so well for over 40 years? That BC Hydro, having lost the right to develop new sources of energy, having lost its transmission lines, having sweetheart contracts forced upon it simply cannot survive?
How do you justify taking away BC Hydro's transmission lines to be surely privatized if the Campbell government is re-elected? If that wasn't the purpose, what was it?
Do you support taking away from local governments the right to pass judgment on energy projects as the government did after the fact with the Ashlu project?
Do you expect the public to accept Mr Neufeld's promise that BC Hydro won't be tubed after the same promise not to privatize BC Rail? In case you raise the tendentious argument that BC Rail was only "leased" let me tell you that if you look as far forward as the "lease" runs, and then look back the same number of years, we're in the reign of Ethelred The Unready!
I'm near the end of a long life and thought, until last Spring, that I'd fought my last battle against the injustices of autocratic government. I was wrong. This is my province in trust for those to come and I intend to use every ounce of my remaining time and energy fighting you bastards. As we say, if the government won't change, we'll just have to change the government which, God willing we'll do barring a Damascus like conversion.
Rafe Mair
Official spokesperson for Save Our Rivers Society (www.saveourrivers.ca)
Those copied or who come into possession of this email are welcome to circulate it as widely as they wish.
Rafe forwarded me this today and I encourage anyone who gives a rat's-butt about BC's rivers and affordable electricity to take few minutes and read it. It's rebuttal to Vickers, and I.P.P. proponent. Please pass it on to all you know.
Campbell has to go! End of story...
Merry Christmas,
Terry Anderson
Mr Vickers -
You accuse me and those who feel as I do of spreading
untruths. After reading your article in the Campbell River paper I'm astonished that a man who gave no facts and confined himself to general attacks on unnamed people could make such an accusation. The nudge, nudge, wink, wink assertions that Save Our Rivers Society is funded by unions (untrue) set the stage for a frothy dissertation that contained not a single fact.
Do you deny that the developers are scarcely Mom and Pop operations but huge international organizations getting in on the 2008 equivalent of a gold rush?
These aren't nice ordinary BC folks with their small businesses but huge wealthy companies like General Electric with the Warren Buffett billions behind them masquerading as Plutonic Energy.
Do you deny that each of these licenses becomes a monopoly with no competition, not for the licensee itself or in the business? That this is a private monopoly system utterly bereft of any competition whatsoever so we're asked to give up our publicly owned monopoly where we get the profits to huge corporations which get all the money.
Do you deny that the profit from IPPS will all go to shareholders of these large companies and not into the BC Treasury where BC Hydro profits go? Surely you must understand that for a petty license fee and what amounts to peppercorn rent thereafter all the profits go not into our schools and hospitals but into the pockets of private shareholders?
Do you deny the environmental carnage that you can see with your own eyes if you go to www.saveourrivers.ca and look at the Powerplay series?
Do you deny that these projects will dam or divert rivers for up to 20 kms and will use up to 95% of the flow? How does the life within the river survive that? Do you deny that these "works" will have serious deleterious effects on fish, both resident and spawning?
Do you deny that once fish are removed or severely depleted the ecosystem dependant upon those depleted rivers is severely damaged? That the contained greenhouse gases thus escape?
Do you deny that these rivers must be reached by large gravel roads which are then permanent?
Do you deny that rights-of-way must be made, mostly by clearcutting, as long as100kms?
Do you not understand that these gravel roads and power lines have a serious adverse effect on wildlife? Or, perhaps, as with fish farms, you don't care?
Do you deny that IPPS have contracts forced upon BC Hydro by the government? Contracts that are indexed to the market?
Do you deny that Hydro will almost certainly be in a position where they cannot recover those sums on the market? They must buy high and sell low? Then, with this immense new obligation to IPPS and no transmission lines, still have to service a nearly $7 billion capital debt?
Do you not understand that the government's spokesman, Dr Mark Jaccard is paid by the government whereas Dr John Calvert and Dr Marvin Shaffer, those he criticizes, are independent? And that Dr Jaccard's Nobel Prize was shared with nine others and had nothing whatever to do with the issue of public or private power or the environmental concerns? And that his attack on Dr Calvert and Dr Shaffer has been thoroughly rebutted (a fact not mentioned by the former minister, now senator)?
Did you really say that BC Hydro couldn't afford to do these IPP projects? Good God, man, I'm a person of very limited assets but just let me have one of those licenses and I'll show within 24 hours how I'll finance it! If you said that, all else you have to say must take into account that you simply don't know what you're talking about but are just protecting the government you support.
Do you truly believe that the environmental assessment process is anywhere near adequate? This is a former Minister of Environment here. It has no power to stop or even change a project (the Pitt River project was stopped, temporarily, because its right-of-way went through a Provincial Park), may be waived by the government and its Director is not a public servant but a Gordon Campbell appointment.
Do you deny that BC Hydro's own statement shows that there is no need for this IPP power? Do you not know that by conservation, taking back our Columbia River Power, re-tooling some of our generators and adding new generators we can more than meet our needs? That this is by BC Hydro assessment in 2007?
Do you not agree that it's the duty of the government to prove our power needs and get some public consensus before taking these drastic, permanent "solutions". No case has been offered much less made and the consultation with the people has not happened.
Can you explain why the government has not even whispered about NAFTA and the problems these projects will cause? This may well be the most serious of all the consequences of this mad energy policy yet neither you, your ilk or the government dare deal with it! For shame!
Do you not understand that once we embark upon this adventure there's no turning back and that we will do to our environment what no American governor would dare do to his?
Do you not realize that you support tearing down the public power system that has served us so well for over 40 years? That BC Hydro, having lost the right to develop new sources of energy, having lost its transmission lines, having sweetheart contracts forced upon it simply cannot survive?
How do you justify taking away BC Hydro's transmission lines to be surely privatized if the Campbell government is re-elected? If that wasn't the purpose, what was it?
Do you support taking away from local governments the right to pass judgment on energy projects as the government did after the fact with the Ashlu project?
Do you expect the public to accept Mr Neufeld's promise that BC Hydro won't be tubed after the same promise not to privatize BC Rail? In case you raise the tendentious argument that BC Rail was only "leased" let me tell you that if you look as far forward as the "lease" runs, and then look back the same number of years, we're in the reign of Ethelred The Unready!
I'm near the end of a long life and thought, until last Spring, that I'd fought my last battle against the injustices of autocratic government. I was wrong. This is my province in trust for those to come and I intend to use every ounce of my remaining time and energy fighting you bastards. As we say, if the government won't change, we'll just have to change the government which, God willing we'll do barring a Damascus like conversion.
Rafe Mair
Official spokesperson for Save Our Rivers Society (www.saveourrivers.ca)
Those copied or who come into possession of this email are welcome to circulate it as widely as they wish.
