Media Release
For Immediate Release June 17, 2005
( PDF,
97kb)
BC Hydro Abandons Vancouver Island Gas Strategy
Now’s the time to focus on efficiency and sustainable
energy
Victoria—The BC Sustainable Energy Association (BCSEA)
congratulates BC Hydro on
its wise decision today to abandon the Duke Point Power gas-fired
electricity project.
This decision brings to an end the utility’s ill-conceived
natural gas strategy for
Vancouver Island.
BC Hydro exercised its option to cancel the project after
Tuesday’s BC Court of Appeal
ruling provided one last legal opportunity to industry and
citizen groups to appeal the BC
Utilities approval of the controversial plant. BCSEA joined
the GSX Concerned Citizens
Coalition, the Society Promoting Environmental Conservation
and the Joint Industry
Electricity Steering Committee in securing the successful
appeal.
“
There are many more sustainable ways to meet Vancouver Island’s
energy needs
without resorting to a gas-fired plant, which would have
released 800,000 tonnes of
greenhouses gases and other nasty pollutants into the air
every year,” said Guy
Dauncey, BCSEA president. “Now is the time to focus
on a serious endeavour to use
clean, sustainable power, combined with a much greater emphasis
on energy savings
through efficiency and conservation.”
For five years, citizen and industry groups, along with
thousands of residents, have
resisted the utility’s plan to make Vancouver Island
dependent on increasingly
expensive, polluting and greenhouse gas-producing natural
gas.
“
Once the replacement cables are installed, we can finally
close the book on the illstarred
gas-fired power strategy,” said BCSEA Coordinator,
Peter Ronald. “All of BC
needs to look to energy efficiency, conservation and clean
renewable energy to build a
truly sustainable energy future for the province,” said
Ronald.
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For more information, contact
Guy Dauncey, President 250-881-1304
Peter Ronald, Coordinator 250-361-3621
Tom Hackney, Director 250-381-4463
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