The Wilderness Committee announced today that 35,000 copies of an educational report entitled “Keep Our Rivers Wild” have been printed and are now being mailed throughout BC to members of the environmental organization.

“I think people who are coming to this issue of private hydro power in BC for the first time are going to be shocked and then angry when they read our report,” explained Gwen Barlee, Wilderness Committee Policy Director.

The report lays out a litany of problems with the BC government's policy of opening up the province's wild rivers to a private hydro power gold rush. Even though rivers undergo severe disruption when many kilometers of their stream-flow are diverted into pipes or tunnels, there is little environmental oversight of these projects in BC. California refuses to classify BC's private hydro power as “green”, therefore disqualifying it from gaining a higher price value in the California market.

Because of the BC government's river privatization policy, BC Hydro will find itself in the position of buying private electricity at very high rates and then being forced to sell this surplus electricity at very low rates – resulting in a significant loss to our public utility. BC Hydro has already asked residential users to ready themselves for increases to their power bills of as much as 50 per cent. The planned increase is being blamed by the BC government on upgrades to BC Hydro's own dams and facilities.

“The fact that the BC government has forced BC Hydro to sign approximately $30 billion of long-term purchase agreements with private hydro developers for electricity at rates far above market value will most certainly impact ratepayers where it hurts the most – in their wallets. I predict a lot of people are going to be very angry when they fully understand what the BC government has done,” said Barlee.

“The fact is BC does not need this overpriced, river-damaging private power. In most years BC actually produces more electricity than we can use and if we needed additional electricity we could bring back power from the Columbia River Treaty for our own domestic use, as we are entitled to do, instead of selling it to the US market,” said Barlee.

Contact:
For more information contact: Gwen Barlee (604) 683-8220 or (604) 202-0322

To read a copy of the Wilderness Committee's report go to: http://wildernesscommittee.org/sites/all/files/publications/2011_rivers…