I found Claude Richmond’s Feb. 19 letter “Speaking up for B.C.’s resource industry” to The Squamish Chief ironically amusing. In it, he is guilty of exactly what he accuses liquefied natural gas (LNG) opponents of doing, namely engaging in a discussion that “is too often not about facts but one dominated by rhetoric, half-truths and misinformation.”
Mr. Richmond claims that “we want the jobs and new investment” and to ensure that LNG development “protects our environment.”
Regarding jobs, the government displays a clear lack of concern about who will get the Woodfibre jobs, if the recent B.C.-China foreign LNG worker agreement is any indication. On the environment, Mr. Richmond conveniently forgot the Mount Polley mine tailings disaster and the fact that the B.C. Liberals repealed the Cap and Trade Act, which was part of the government’s Climate Action Plan. The government claims that LNG is clean. Even under a best case scenario, according to the B.C. government LNG report by Globe Advisors, LNG produces three tons of carbon dioxide for every ton of LNG produced when emissions from wellhead to end use by the customer are counted – or roughly 140 per cent of the carbon dioxide from natural gas.
Hopes for LNG-driven prosperity are pinned on LNG prices above $15/mmBTUs in Asia that were due to the Fukushima disaster in 2011. However, since then, Asian LNG prices have fallen back to earth and are now projected at between $10 and $12/mmBTUs as new power facilities come on-stream. But the IEA has estimated that B.C. LNG will be among the most expensive in the world at $13 to $14/mmBTUs to produce and deliver. Who will pick up the tab to dismantle and clean up LNG facilities if prices don’t soar and these projects are abandoned?
Mr. Richmond has also clearly forgotten our last 1970s energy foray into Asia. According to the Canadian Press article “Northeast Coal Never Fulfilled Its Promise” (February 14, 2000), our province and the federal government funded coal infrastructure from Tumbler Ridge to Prince Rupert at a cost of $1.6 billion plus hundreds of millions in related costs based on 15-year contracts with Japanese customers at well above the market price. Before the first Japanese freighter loaded its first Ridley Island shipment in January 1984, the steelmakers began demanding cuts in volume and price. Sound familiar?
Today Tumbler Ridge has 70 per cent unemployment, and most mining jobs went to Chinese temporary workers. What backup plan does government have to prevent a similar fate befalling B.C. workers and taxpayers again?
What are the potential rewards? Meagre projected income taxes and royalties and a few hundred WLNG jobs without guarantees that they will go to B.C. workers? This is a great deal for owner Sukanto Tanoto of Singapore but a decidedly poor deal for B.C.
Matt Blackman
Squamish
