Tag Archives: BC Hydro

Energy

BC Hydro work continues on Cortes Island this week

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The two 12-hour power outages on May 24 and June 7 were part of BC Hydro’s ongoing Jervis Inlet and Agamemnon Channel Power Line Replacement Project. Crews took advantage of this to replace poles and aging equipment, as well as trim trees that were too close to power lines on Cortes Island.

Precision Tree Service was brought in to trim trees. The company is based in Comox, and they worked two 16-hour days, leaving home at 6 a.m. and returning at about 10 p.m. Their work is now complete.

BC Hydro crews will continue to replace poles and aging equipment this week. Some residences have received outage notices specific to their street/area. A worklist copied from the BC Hydro planned outage map follows below. 

Continue reading BC Hydro work continues on Cortes Island this week →
Communications

BC’s new data centre cluster sparks new discussion of ‘sovereign’ AI push

By Sonal Gupta, Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

TELUS is pushing ahead with plans for a major AI data-centre cluster in British Columbia after being selected under Ottawa’s large-scale AI data-centre initiative. But the project is raising questions about who will ultimately control that infrastructure and whether BC’s clean power grid can absorb the electricity demand.

The project announced Monday with federal backing, would start with 85 megawatts of power from BC Hydro and scale to 150 megawatts, and over 60,000 NVIDIA GPUs, by 2032.

It includes three sites: an AI facility in Kamloops launching later this year, a Mount Pleasant location opening in 2026 and expanding through 2028 and a 10-storey data centre near BC Place set for 2029.

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Energy

Who really pays for BC’s power?

By Matt Simmons, The Narwhal, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

The average home in British Columbia uses around 10,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year.

There are approximately 2.2 million homes in B.C. This means the province needs to make sure the grid has enough energy to supply about 22 billion kilowatt hours every year to keep those homes warm and the lights on.

And that’s just for homes. It doesn’t include all the electricity needed for industry, businesses and a rapidly expanding electric-vehicle market.

In B.C., the average resident pays around $100 a month for electricity, roughly $1,200 per year for those 10,000 kilowatt hours.

Residential rates just went up on April 1, when BC Hydro increased its rates by 3.75 per cent. That’s partly to start paying off some of the sunk costs the government has already invested in building new power infrastructure.

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Energy

BC Hydro Replacing Switches on Pole-Mounted Transformers

BC Hydro is replacing the switches on pole-mounted transformers set up beside private residences and buildings on Cortes Island.  

They subcontracted this work to Allteck, an electric ransmission & distribution services company with a branch office in Nanaimo. A three-person crew arrived in Squirrel Cove on Tuesday, March 10. Two of them either use a bucket truck or climb the pole, while the third supports them from the ground. Once set up, the whole procedure typically takes about half an hour per transformer.

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Energy, Indigenous Nations

Wind energy project empowers We Wai Kum First Nation

Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Wei Wai Kum First Nation is charting a new course as the majority owner of one Vancouver Island’s largest new power sources following decades of exclusion from energy projects in their own territory. 

The Yə̓yus Energy, formerly known as the Brewster Wind Project, is a $600-million, 197-megawatt wind farm with 30 turbines that will be located northwest of Campbell River. Wei Wai Kum owns 51 per cent of the wind project while Capstone, a Toronto-based renewable energy firm, owns the remainder. 

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