When Nicholas Stern, former chief economist at the World Bank, released his ground-breaking study in late 2006 on the future costs of climate change, he talked about a massive market failure. He was referring to the failure of the market to incorporate the climate change costs of burning fossil fuels. The costs, he said, would be measured in the trillions of dollars. The difference between the market prices for fossil fuels and the prices that also incorporate their environmental costs to society are huge.
The roots of our current dilemma lie in the enormous growth of the human enterprise over the last century. Since 1900, the world economy has expanded 20-fold and world population has increased fourfold. Although there were places in 1900 where local demand exceeded the capacity of natural systems, this was not a global issue. There was some deforestation, but overpumping of water was virtually unheard of, overfishing was rare, and carbon emissions were so low that there was no serious effect on climate. The indirect costs of these early excesses were negligible.
The ill-conceived BC Energy Plan presently being implemented by the Campbell government outlaws BC Hydro from producing any more power in the future. Instead BC Hydro must now purchase it from private power producers who are essentially being given rights by the government to all our watersheds here in BC.
The idea is being sold to the public as “run of the river” or “green” energy. Although some projects do fall within those parameters, in truth most of these projects are large industrial endeavors that create environmental devastation involving dams, diversion tunnels, clear-cutting and road building through old growth forest for new transmission lines. Large corporations are looking at projected profits of one million plus per year. The people of British Columbia stand to gain nothing from this giveaway of our public resources. What we get out of it is a trashed environment and increased hydro rates.
Currently there are licenses on over 600 rivers and streams in BC, with the potential for 6000 licenses over the next decade. So long Supernatural British Columbia!
The project proposed for Glacier and Howser Creeks just north of Kootenay Lake by Axor Corporation of Montreal is the largest and most destructive to date here in BC. They plan to divert the water from both creeks and three smaller tributaries into two tunnels 4.5 meters in diameter totalling 16 kms. in length. (producing 300,000 cubic meters of rock-muck sledge). “Run of the River” implies the water is returned to the creek beds to proliferate the ecosystem it supports. (i.e. spawning Bull Trout etc). Not so! These diversion points are 10 and 12 kilometers upstream from the mouths of these pristine creeks. The water is never returned to the creek beds. It travels through the tunnels to a powerhouse on Duncan Lake reservoir where it is then dumped into the lake.
With a proposed diversion of 90% of mean stream flow to feed the turbines, there will be virtually little or no creek left existing downstream from the diversion points.
Another consideration is that Glacier Creek forestry road is access to the beautiful backcountry of Monica Meadows, Jumbo Pass, and Starbird Glacier which many of us enjoy. The possibility exists that this road will be gated by Axor. They so no (of course), but similar completed projects in BC are gated with backing by government legislation….so you decide for yourself whether to believe them on this one.
Axor is saying this will create jobs. Yes, perhaps a few in the construction phase for loggers to clear the site and cut transmission corridors for power lines. Most of the labour will be contract or union out of Alberta. Yes, that’s Albertans helping to trash our environment and taking the money back home with them. When completed, this fully automated structure will permanently employ only 1-2 people, as does the similar completed Ashlu River project on the coast. It’s a very high price for pay for loss of our incredible natural environment here in the beautiful Kootenays…for just a few short term jobs.
Hope you enjoy the video. Better yet I hope it moves you to speak and work together to stop this travesty by a government backed corporation planning to destroy our backyard.
Last Updated ( Monday, 15 December 2008 03:42 )
RISING SEAS AND POWERFUL STORMS THREATEN GLOBAL SECURITY
Written by Janet Larsen
Friday, 10 October 2008 05:08
Standing before the United Nations General Assembly in October 1987, Maumoon Abdul Gayoom, President of the Maldives, made an appeal representing “an endangered nation.” That year for the first time, “unusual high waves” in the Indian Ocean inundated a quarter of the urban area on the capital island of Male’, flooded farms, and washed away reclaimed land. Gayoom cited scientific evidence that human activities were releasing greenhouse gases that warm the planet, ultimately raising global sea level as glaciers melt and warmer water expands. The trouble extended beyond small islands; studies showed that rising seas would wreak havoc on the U.S. Gulf Coast, the Netherlands, and the river deltas of Egypt and Bangladesh.
Fast-forward through two decades of swelling seas and more powerful storms and the call has moved from the need to study global warming to the necessity of dramatic action to stabilize climate. With small island nations in peril, these days President Gayoom evokes the vision of a United Nations where “name plates are gone; seats are empty.” He does not speak alone: this fall, some 50 countries, including a number of small island nations along with Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the European Union, are planning to put a resolution before the U.N. General Assembly requesting that the U.N. Security Council address “the threat posed by climate change to international peace and security.” As Ambassador Stuart Beck of Palau has asked, “Would any nation facing an invading army not do the same?”
MOBILIZING TO SAVE CIVILIZATION: WHAT YOU AND I CAN DO
Written by Lester R. Brown
Friday, 26 September 2008 18:05
Lester R. Brown
One of the questions I am frequently asked when I am speaking in various countries is, given the environmental problems that the world is facing, can we make it? That is, can we avoid economic decline and the collapse of civilization? My answer is always the same: it depends on you and me, on what you and I do to reverse these trends. It means becoming politically active. Saving our civilization is not a spectator sport.
We have moved into this new world so fast that we have not yet fully grasped the meaning of what is happening. Traditionally, concern for our children has translated into getting them the best health care and education possible. But if we do not act quickly to reverse the earth’s environmental deterioration, eradicate poverty, and stabilize population, their world will decline economically and disintegrate politically.
The following article is submitted on behalf of the environment we live in and its intent is to inform and educate the ‘environmental community’ on one person’s opinion about how to solve our “Earth’s” problems. I hope to submit many more articles from the “Earth Policy Institute” for thought provoking discussion and debate.
Since the publication of Silent Spring and the birth of the modern environmental movement, the environmental community has worked hard to arrest the deterioration of the Earth’s health. Many battles have been won, but we are losing the war. The Earth’s capacity to support the economy continues to deteriorate. The gap between what we need to do to arrest the deterioration of the Earth and what we are doing continues to widen.
Somehow we have to turn the tide. The Earth Policy Institute was founded May 2001 by Lester Brown and Reah Janise Kauffman to provide a vision of a sustainable future and a plan for how to get from here to there.
The world produced an estimated 130 million bicycles in 2007 -- more than twice the 52 million cars produced. Bicycle and car production tracked each other closely in the mid-to-late 1960s, but bike output separated sharply from that of cars in 1970, beginning its steep climb to 105 million in 1988. Following a slowdown between 1989 and 2001, bike production has regained steam, increasing in each of the last six years. Much of the recent growth has been driven by the rise in electric, or “e-bike” production, which has doubled since 2004 to 21 million units in 2007. Overall, since 1970, bicycle output has nearly quadrupled, while car production has roughly doubled.
Promoting the bike as a clean and efficient alternative to the personal automobile is a practical way for cities to reduce traffic congestion and smog. To simultaneously confront those problems as well as climate change and an emerging obesity epidemic, government leaders and advocacy groups are working to bring cycling back to prominence in the urban transport mix.
A number of European cities have set the standard for bicycle use and promotion, via pro-bike transportation and land use policies, as well as heavy funding for bicycle infrastructure and public education. In Copenhagen, for example, 36 percent of commuters bike to work...
