Does The Right Hand Know What The Left Hand Is Doing

By Ben Meisner

It is another case of the lets spend a bunch of money, our money, and see if it works.

The cold water release facility that is now being touted by Henry Klassen and his crew from out of Vanderhoof shows that whatever his group is called, it obviously doesn’t listen to the scientific community.

Had the group taken the time to read the recent Levy, Woodey and Hardy report on the future of the sockeye in the Upper Fraser and had they taken time to talk to any one of these individuals or at the very least read what they had to say, these biologists would have told them that the cold water release they are now slapping their sides in glee for, won’t work.

It’s not unlike the warm water release facility into the Nechako to break up the ice and stop the flooding on the Nechako; it didn’t work but by God were not going to let anyone think otherwise.

Read the report you people, for your information here are the comments from the director of the Upper Fraser Fisheries conservation Alliance.

“As for increased water temperatures, well, there’s been a lot of talk about the need for a cold water release as a method of keeping the Nechako cool enough for salmon migration. David Levy says a cold water

release won’t make any difference “I don’t believe it would help. The main reason is you’re using a smaller volume of very cold water to cool down the Nechako. By the time the water reaches the Nechako-Stuart confluence, there is very little detectable influence of that cold water release. Certainly you could never get cooler temperatures in Prince George.”

Now MLA John Rustad says, we can build this cold water release for about $100 million and we will be able to manufacture power from it. Now who is going to own that power generation John, Alcan / Rio Tinto after we hand over $50 million towards the project?

Have you read the report John or are you in the dark?  For that matter are you all in the dark?

Before we head off and spend $50 million as a minimum (and there is no guarantee that figure will not be double) of the taxpayers money, better have a talk to the people who have studied the salmon migration. If you want a cold water release it has to provide cold water at the mouth of the Nechako not at some point decided by you and Alcan far upstream unless you somehow are going to give the fish a free cab ride for the first 120 kilometres.

Finally would someone lie to rest the idea that there would have been no flood in Vanderhoof last year if we had Kemano 2?  Alcan’s power lines were knocked out of commission because of heavy snow, they could only produce one half of the power they normally do, and they don’t have the ability to spill water through the Kemano River.

It wouldn’t have mattered if they had fifty generators and the lines went down, either then or in the future. You still would get a flood in this region if you have nowhere to send the water but down the Nechako in either winter or summer.

I grow tired of listening to people trying to sell the idea of Kemano 2 by saying if we had the project completed we wouldn’t have had a flood. It’s a bit like what we are now hearing from Henry’s group, toss the idea out and see where it lands, well it should land in the garbage dump.

I’m Meisner and that’s one man’s opinion.  

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