We need NDP MLAs to speak out on Site C

Premier John Horgan’s decision to proceed with the Site C dam at a cost of $16 billion and counting is wrong on every level. It’s bad for the environment and food security. It violates Indigenous treaty rights. It’s unnecessary, unsafe, and financially reckless.

Site C will destroy farmland and wilderness at a time when we desperately need the enormous potential of the Peace River Valley to support long-term food security and to mitigate the effects of climate change and environmental degradation.

Hydro megaprojects like Site C are not clean and not green. They suck up investment that should be diverted to renewables such as geothermal, solar, and wind, whose costs continue to go down.

Even if we ignore the overwhelming social, cultural and environmental costs, Site C will have a devastating economic impact — it’s a textbook example of the sunk cost fallacy (better known as throwing good money after bad).

The site’s geological instability creates significant safety risks, and costs will inevitably continue to skyrocket, with B.C. ratepayers and taxpayers paying the price.

Despite the many reasons, both pragmatic and ethical, to cancel Site C, Horgan stubbornly insists on proceeding with the project, while still blaming the previous Liberal government for starting the whole mess in the first place.

What is truly disheartening is that not one NDP MLA has shown the courage to buck party discipline by speaking out against this boondoggle.

Maureen Woodall Victoria