Resource: Recommendations for Responsible Clean Electricity Development in British Columbia
Authors / Publisher: David Suzuki Foundation, Pembina Institute, Watershed Watch Salmon Society, and West Coast Environmental Law
Date: December 2009
Watershed Watch worked with the David Suzuki Foundation, Pembina Institute and West Coast Environmental Law to develop this report addressing concerns about how renewable electricity is currently planned, promoted and developed in BC.
Six basic recommendations are offered in the report in the direction government should take in clean electricity planning and development. Specifically, the groups above believe that British Columbia’s progress on clean electricity policy and development can be dramatically improved by:
- Ensuring that energy conservation and efficiency is the highest priority.
- Making BC’s electricity supply as clean, renewable and low-impact as possible.
- Adopting a renewable electricity planning framework that limits environmental, social, and economic impacts and maximizes public benefit.
- Reforming water licensing, land leasing decisions and governance.
- Strengthening the environmental assessment process, addressing and managing cumulative effects, and improving monitoring and compliance performance.
- Developing an informed consensus about the conditions whereby renewable electricity could be exported from BC, if at all.