1) The government keeps making bad decisions that are driving BC Hydro rates up and up. This will result in more people going off grid, which will increase rates, and so on and so on. The death spiral gains momentum.
“Just after the last election, Premier Christy Clark surprised families across B.C. with a staggering 28 per cent hydro rate hike. By missing their debt reduction plan by more than $1 billion dollars, BC Hydro and the Christy Clark government could saddle ratepayers with another $500 hike each right after the next election.” John Horgan
http://novosolar.com/billion-dollar-mistake-means-more-bc-hydro-rate-hikes-coming/
See letter below from Erik Andersen, Economist, about BC Hydro’s financial irresponsible, inaccurate projections. The truth does not justify Site C or any further expansion. Now BC Hydro will increase rates because industry isn’t using enough power. Yet this government plans to carry on with destroying land and the environment for their corporate buddies.
2) Dr. Martha Herbert is a researcher who has studied the effects of RF and who has raised concerns about the possible relationship between RF exposure and autism.
Announcement of a radio interview with Dr. Martha Herbert which will take place on:
Sunday, Aug. 14th, from 10:00-11:00 am EST:
http://ehlradio.com/
The interview can be downloaded for free hopefully by Tuesday (August 16). Please mark your calendar because I will most likely forget to send a reminder.
In the archives of the same radio broadcast, you can also listen to an interview with Devra Davis (Feb. 7) and Elizabeth Plourde (Jan. 3). These can be downloaded for free.
3) From a member on Vancouver Island. If anyone is in the Courtenay area, could you please take some photos of these stealth transmitters and share? The Municipal Council would have been advised about these, as per the Industry Canada policies, but if the Council has not written an Antenna Siting Consultation Policy, the companies can get away with advising residences and businesses within 3 times the height of tower – and no one else.
“Today we encountered two stealth towers, close together, in Courtenay, by Rogers and Telus. Location – Moray Ave. industrial park on the right as you enter Courtenay.
They are tall, thick, white pillar structures and look out of place in an industrial park with seemingly no purpose. One is a single column and the other a triple column unit with connecting panels at the top.
We took a quick meter reading while driving by. Very intense emissions – 5.6mW/m2 . There were still buildings between us! If we would have taken readings for a longer time period, it would have gone even higher.
Why are people not allowed to know, that they are working in the shadow of two nasty microwave transmitters? Why such perverse deception of stealth towers?”
4) A lightbulb that connects to the internet via a ZigBee chip is vulnerable to hacking. And we’re supposed to feel comfortable with ZigBee chips in the $$meter and every appliance/electrical device in and on our homes!!
“Security researchers have discovered nine vulnerabilities in a range of internet-connected light bulbs made by Osram.
That could give an attacker access to a user’s home wi-fi network and the devices connected to it, if the password was extracted from the app.
The firm said the remaining unpatched problems involved the ZigBee hub – a device that sits between the light bulbs and a home wi-fi router to relay commands to the lamps.”
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36903274
Letters:
From: Jerry Flynn
Sent: August 7, 2016
To: ‘John Harding’ <editor@pqbnews.com>
Subject: Cell Tower Dangers are Deliberately Hidden – not Overblown!
Dear Editor,
This is in reply to Nicole Parton’s misguided letter to the PBQ News of Thursday, August 4, 2016 [http://www.pqbnews.com/opinion/letters/389187421.html].
Thank you. Jerry Flynn (contact details below)
Cell Tower Dangers are Deliberately Hidden – not Overblown!
Nicole Parton’s strong pro-Telus stance with respect to cell towers and her clear dependence on her cell phone reveals that she too has been victimized by mainstream media’s sinful 40-year silence on the dangers of all wireless technology! She, like all Canadians, has a right to know that:
- Many studies from around the world produce similar findings: living within 400 m of a cell tower for 10 years increases one’s risk of getting cancer 3 times, rising to about 10 times the risk for female cancers! [1] [2]
- In 2016, the highly respected US National Toxicology Program (NTP) released the initial results of its 10-year $25-million study which showed that cell phone radiation boosts cancer rates (brain tumors)! [3]
- Since 2015, 220 of the world’s leading EMF scientists from 41 counties have signed the “International EMF Scientists Appeal” addressed to the Secretary General of the United Nations, to all UN-member countries, and to the Director General of the World Health Organization. The Appeal urged all addressees to “Protect mankind and wildlife from the dangers of EMF and wireless technology”! [4]
- In 2015, France established its own national radiation regulatory agency and immediately banned Wi-Fi in all nursery schools across the country, stating, in part, that for children up to 11 years of age, schools must turn off Wi-Fi when not in use! [5]
- In 2014, 55 Canadian doctors openly criticized Health Canada and called on them to: “Protect Canadians from EMFs!” [6]
- In 2014, 53 scientists from 18 countries openly criticized Safety Code 6 and urged Health Canada to intervene in order to: “Prevent an emerging health crisis”! [7]
Sincerely,
James G. (“Jerry”) Flynn, Captain (Retired)
References
[3] http://microwavenews.com/news-center/ntp-cancer-results
[4] http://www.saferemr.com/2015/06/international-scientist-appeal-on.html
[7] http://www.albany.edu/ihe/assets/Scientist_Declaration.pdf
__________________________________________________________________________
From: ERIK ANDERSEN
To: “client” <services@moodys.com>
Cc: “Andrew Weaver” <Andrew.Weaver.MLA@leg.bc.ca>, “Auditor General” <bcauditor@bcauditor.com>, “B C Sustainable Energy” <guydauncey@earthfuture.com>, “BC Chamber of Commerce” <bccc@bcchamber.org>, jgarson@bcchamber.org, jwinter@bcchamber.org, “Moody’s” <clientservices@moodys.com>
Sent: August 7, 2016
Subject: Re: Drop in industrial demand to cost BC Hydro $3.5 billion
Dear Mr. Yake;
I too wish to express my concurrence with X’s sentiments.
Adequately educated and competent managers and boards of directors should be able to demonstrate financial and economic literacy.
In 2006 BC Hydro posted a total revenue of $2,619 millions serving 1,511,435 residential customers ; 189,764 light industrial & commercial customers and 146 large industrial customers. For these domestic customers BC Hydro sold 50,602 GWhrs. To help operate the corporation BC Hydro used $11,000 millions of net total liability and for the first year in a series of increases, posted $863 million in regulatory assets (as you know that is simply credit card spending, money to yet be collected from its customers). I am not aware of the amount of IPP contract obligations outstanding but that would have added to liabilities.
Now in the most recent fiscal year BC Hydro collected $4,293 million from the same three domestic customer groups. So over the eleven years to 2016, gross revenues were increased by $1,674 millions or 64 %, for an increase in number of residential customers of 16%; in light industrial & commercial of 8.4% and an increase in large industrial customers of 3%. The most telling value is the absence of change of total demand from the three types of customers. In 2016 total demand, expressed as sales of GWhrs, was 49,421 or a decrease of 2.3% from 2006.
This measure of need by BC Hydro customers was almost the same throughout the eleven years with only the imagination of the BC Government and BC Hydro supporting the notion that by 2016 total domestic demand would exceed 60,000 GWhrs annually.
As a measure of the financial and economic illiteracy at BC Hydro and with the Government, while it needed roughly $217,383 of total liabilities to deliver 1 GWhr to its customers in 2006, the boards and managements brought total net liabilities, before counting IPP contractual liabilities and regulatory assets accounts, to $30,034 millions or $607,717 per GWhr, a mind blowing increase of 280%. To this appalling record we can add another $50 billion of IPP contract obligations.
The insult of this article is made worse when the BC Hydro CEO shows surprise at the terrible state of affairs at BC Hydro. Economic and financially literate managers and board members would have known in 2008 and 2009 that the old economic cycle had exhausted itself. The Baltic Dry Cargo index collapsed from nearly 13,000 to 600 in a matter of less than 6 months. Even with a “dead cat” bounce to 2,000 in 2010, it was not sustained much over 1,000 ever since with recent numbers into the 400s. In BC we have one of the foremost educational resources on commodity trends. David Jacks has recorded, in constant dollars, US commodity prices for the past century. Ignorance of commodity price cycles has to be one of the best indicators of an intellectual deficit in a province so reliant of resource royalties as is BC.
This mind-blowing financial/business record would have never happened without the business being a monopoly supported completely by the BC taxpayer. A credit rating agency such as Moody’s, standing quietly while this horror show went on, has to be worth nothing other than to its paymaster, in this case the BC government. Just a little conflict of interest here don’t you think? Shame shame on you folks and the BC Utilities Commission.
Regards, Erik Andersen.
Economist
= = =
From: X
To: “Moody’s” <clientservices@moodys.com>
Cc: “Andrew Weaver” <Andrew.Weaver.MLA@leg.bc.ca>, “Auditor General” <bcauditor@bcauditor.com>, “B C Sustainable Energy” <guydauncey@earthfuture.com>, “BC Chamber of Commerce” <bccc@bcchamber.org>, jgarson@bcchamber.org, jwinter@bcchamber.org
Sent: August 6, 2016
Subject: Drop in industrial demand to cost BC Hydro $3.5 billion
Dear Mr. Yake,
This is yet another article and example of the incompetence of the management of BC Hydro’s financial affairs. It might be suggested that this borders on irresponsible behavior. Your attention to this issue is urgently needed.
How can you give our public utility a stellar rating????
Yours truly
X
Drop in industrial demand to cost BC Hydro $3.5 billion
[http://vancouversun.com/business/energy/drop-in-industrial-demand-to-cost-bc-hydro-3-5-billion]
DERRICK PENNER
More from Derrick Penner
Published on: July 28, 2016 | Last Updated: July 28, 2016 7:42 PM PDT
BC Hydro president and CEO Jessica McDonald. NICK PROCAYLO / VANCOUVER SUN
Faltering electricity demand among industrial customers will cost BC Hydro $3.5 billion less in revenue — over the term of its 10-year financial plan — than anticipated when the utility first unveiled in 2013, CEO Jessica McDonald said Thursday.
In response, BC Hydro will cut costs including expenses for electricity conservation programs, re-prioritizing capital projects and reducing its use of outside contractors.
“We had a choice,” McDonald said. “Instead of passing those issues on to our customers, we gave careful thought to new measures to reduce our costs even further so we could stick to our plan to ensure low and predictable rates.”
However, BC Hydro will still have to borrow as much as $795 million over three years through its rate-smoothing deferral account — on top of rate increases that it is seeking — in order to meet revenue needs.
McDonald unveiled BC Hydro’s revised demand and revenue forecasts for the next three years as the utility filed its latest application for rate increases with the B.C. Utilities Commission.
In the application, B.C. Hydro is asking the commission to finalize the four per cent interim rate increase that took effect April 1 for 2016, a 3.5 per cent increase for 2017, and three per cent for 2018, which were the limits for rate raises prescribed by the provincial government in late 2013.
However, in the application, BC Hydro also asks for permission to use its rate-smoothing deferral account to cover “the balance of its revenue requirement that is not forecast to be recovered by the proposed rates.”
In the document, Hydro estimates that will require borrowing $210 million for fiscal year 2017, $286 million in 2018 and $299.4 million in 2019.
The rate-smoothing account is intended to protect ratepayers from short-term shocks to the system, allowing the utility to spread costs incurred in one year over several years that would otherwise require bigger rate increases.
However, energy lawyer Jim Quail characterized BC Hydro’s request in this application as “borrowing money from future ratepayers for today’s and yesterday’s consumption.”
In its annual report released last week, BC Hydro reported that it used the rate-smoothing account to raise $121 million for the fiscal year that just ended March 31, at which point the account’s balance stood at $287 million.
“Rate-smoothing is a euphemism for trying to contain a huge bulge in rates that would naturally flow from government policy,” said Quail, who represents BC Hydro employees.
And he guessed that “the government is hoping to slide through the next election without having to live with the political consequences (of that).”
BC Hydro delayed making the application it filed Thursday to re-evaluate how its forecast was changing because of the faltering rate of demand growth by industrial customers.
In its annual report, BC Hydro noted that consumption by industrial customers fell by three per cent in 2016.
In its rate application, the utility noted that industrial customers have been hurt by declining commodity prices and delays in final investment decisions for major liquefied natural gas export proposals also weighed on the forecast.
“(The) decline in the rate of industrial customer load growth posed a new and significant impediment to achieving the 2013 10-year rates plan,” the report reads.
McDonald said BC Hydro will re-prioritize capital spending to cut $380 million in spending over the next three years, reduce contracting out by $20 million and seek to renew contracts with independent power producers at electricity prices lower than their initial contracts.
However, even with the short-term dent in industrial electricity consumption, BC Hydro is still estimating a 39 per cent increase in power demand over the next 20 years, which is only a marginal difference from the 40 per cent estimated in its 2013 forecast.
And the short-term shift hasn’t swayed BC Hydro’s plans to forge ahead with construction of the $9-billion Site C dam project on the Peace River, which McDonald characterizes as “critical to providing the firm capacity required to meet growing demand.”
depenner@postmedia.com
twitter.com/derrickpenner
Sharon Noble
Director, Coalition to Stop Smart Meters
“You will observe with concern how long a useful truth may be known, and exist, before it is generally received and acted on.”
~ Ben Franklin