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Contested Knowledges in Hydroelectric Project Assessment: The Case of Canada’s Site C Project Bakker, Karen; Hendriks, Richard

Abstract

This paper analyzes contestation over aspects of the Site C Project on the Peace River in northeastern British Columbia, Canada. The $10.7 billion project, which is now under construction, has been vigorously debated for over 30 years. Initially proposed in the 1980s, project approval was not granted following review by the BC Utilities Commission, as the need for the project was not established. In 2010, the provincial government enacted legislation to exempt the project from future review by the BC Utilities Commission; an environmental assessment was initiated in 2012 and a constrained review by the Commission was undertaken in 2017, after construction had commenced. The paper explores key examples of contested knowledge regimes within the review process, focusing on debates over cumulative effects and greenhouse gas emissions. The analysis provides technical examples of the ways in which differing societal values are deployed and co-produced within regulatory processes.

Item Metadata

Title
Contested Knowledges in Hydroelectric Project Assessment: The Case of Canada’s Site C Project
Creator
Bakker, Karen; Hendriks, Richard
Publisher
Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute
Date Issued
2019-02-26
Description
This paper analyzes contestation over aspects of the Site C Project on the Peace River in northeastern British Columbia, Canada. The $10.7 billion project, which is now under construction, has been vigorously debated for over 30 years. Initially proposed in the 1980s, project approval was not granted following review by the BC Utilities Commission, as the need for the project was not established. In 2010, the provincial government enacted legislation to exempt the project from future review by the BC Utilities Commission; an environmental assessment was initiated in 2012 and a constrained review by the Commission was undertaken in 2017, after construction had commenced. The paper explores key examples of contested knowledge regimes within the review process, focusing on debates over cumulative effects and greenhouse gas emissions. The analysis provides technical examples of the ways in which differing societal values are deployed and co-produced within regulatory processes.
Subject
Hydroelectric development; Hydropower; Dam; Indigenous peoples; First nations; Site C; Environmental impacts; Socio-economic impacts
Geographic Location
Peace River (B.C. and Alta.)
Genre
Article
Type
Text
Language
eng
Date Available
2019-04-23
Provider
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
Rights
CC BY 4.0
DOI
10.14288/1.0378350
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/2429/69825
Affiliation
Arts, Faculty of; Non UBC; Geography, Department of
Citation
Water 11 (3): 406 (2019)
Publisher DOI
10.3390/w11030406
Peer Review Status
Reviewed
Scholarly Level
Faculty
Rights URI
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Aggregated Source Repository
DSpace

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CC BY 4.0