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Lindsay Brown Profile picture
@Lidsville
Jul 6, 2020 • 15 tweets • 14 min read • Read on X
Sorry to use a topical weather aphorism, but it never rains but it pours at #SiteC. The 2 reservoirs above Site C are reaching full pond; heavy rains pushed woody debris onto the Site C debris boom; & now there are rumours of river diversion tunnel structural problems 1/x #bcpoli
..Keeping in mind that secrecy is high at #SiteC & it's hard for info to break through the opacity, especially now with more social distancing, have a look at this report by a Peace area resident in the "Say NO to Site C Dam!" Facebook group. #bcpoli facebook.com/groups/5491717… Image
Again: none of this is confirmed. I am just flagging it because it so closely matches predictions by several of my sources who had worked in those tunnels. This section: "Word in the valley is that one of the diversion tunnels being built has big structural issues." #SiteC
Given the unusual rains, maybe we should be asking for transparency about what's going on at the #SiteC site, whether or not a safety review is in order, and whether or not we should be seeing a revised budget, given that all these geotechnical problems are costing us all money.
Please assure us of safety of #SiteC workers & downstream residents, Premier @jjhorgan & Energy Minister @BruceRalston. The public deserves transparency re: conditions in the river diversion tunnels, as the September deadline to divert the Peace River thru them fast approaches.
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston More remarks from Peace region resident Randy Hadland's post on reports of trouble in the #SiteC diversion tunnels. Hadland is a longtime observer of the #SiteC project & in my experience extremely well informed. We need #BCHydro & #BCNDP to put these rumours to rest. #bcpoli Image
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston ..One concerning section: reports saying "They are having trouble solidifying the exit on one tunnel, so if they start the diversion they could have excessive erosion at that point & the erosion could start to eat backward into the hill. Not good for...the camp directly above..."
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston ..& worse, we're hearing 'There is also some problem with..one of the joins between two of the [interior concrete tunnel] forms which would allow water to leak from the tunnel' - and into the surrounding shale, which as we know has neither shear nor bearing strength when wet.
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston I avoid reporting rumour but the reason I think we need these reports contradicted by the BC govt & BC Hydro is that they eerily match warnings by both engineer observer friends & by worker sources with first hand stories from the tunnels. And because safety stakes are so high.
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston Here's one story from a worker in the first #SiteC diversion tunnel, told to me in person in January. It's re: the machine they use to try & stabilize the tunnels bored through the weak shale. It pours a thick concrete liner behind a mould, to line the tunnel & prevent collapse.
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston He said they poured the mould in segments, then inched the machine forward to the next segment. There's a join between each. They clamp the machine to the tunnel at each segment but can forget to remove them, dragging them along the roof..He described the process as "a shitshow."
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston (PS It's not surprising mistakes like that were made in the tunnels. Same worker source said that the silica dust was often so thick in the tunnels that he *could not see the end of his own arm.* #SiteC was slapped with a nearly $1 million fine for that.) cbc.ca/news/canada/br…
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston These joins between segments of concrete liner in #SiteC` tunnels have also been flagged by engineers looking at @sitecproject's own photos of the tunnel interiors, as a weak point. So again: can we please have assurance from govt & Hydro that this river diversion will be safe?
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston @sitecproject I see I have an upset NDP/union guy on this thread from one of the unions that lobbied hard for #SiteC: Unifor. Unsurprising I guess. To review, unions lobbied for #SiteC. Interestingly, they haven't yelled about dangerous conditions for workers on site. thenarwhal.ca/ndp-union-heav…
@jjhorgan @BruceRalston @sitecproject To keep everything together, some recent #SiteC threads:

On rains & landslide risk to our dams:


On clogged #SiteC debris boom:


Former Hydro dam construction mgr @daveunger3 on Peace reservoirs filling up

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More from @Lidsville

Lindsay Brown Profile picture
Sep 13
Chasing the far-right by making cowardly concessions and U-turns is generally a losing strategy. Nice race to the far-right corner of the bottom of the barrel, Dave.

If you were in any doubt as to who Dave Eby really is, I hope today made things clear #bcpoli #carbontax
BC Greens should be explicitly campaigning up the left side of the NDP now and yanking this ever-rightward-shifting Overton window back. To do that they're going to have to abandon this kind of talk immediately.
#bcpoli insider on NDP nixing carbon tax: "people get more in personal carbon rebate cheques than they pay in fuel tax costs. I don't get why they did this; it's political insanity. They're literally scrapping a version of UBI, plus it'll put trade/ climate agreements in jeopardy
Read 6 tweets
Lindsay Brown Profile picture
May 25
Quite a bizarre performance by BC Conservatives leader John Rustad on CBC Radio today. For a populist demagogue he's very wooden - he just kept repeating “we have to get rid of the BC NDP with their radical agenda/policies” over & over, like a broken droid. 1/x #bcpoli
Frustratingly CBC's @BellePuri never asked Rustad which BC NDP policies he thinks are "radical." The BC NDP are so captured by the corporations at the trough - arguably more than the BC Liberals before them - that I'd be astonished to find anything really "radical" there...
@BellePuri The only difference is that the BC NDP are doing right-wing corporate capture with a veneer of rainbow crosswalks, while the Cons are corporate capture with social conservatism & toxic masculinity. Which flavour do you want your trickle-up of wealth to come in?
Read 22 tweets
Lindsay Brown Profile picture
Mar 28
Important WSJ article on Canada's rivers drying up while we keep building dams anyway, including #SiteC. It's paywalled so I'll include the whole article in this 🧵

Diversify into renewables now! BC can't until it ditches the deceptively named Clean Energy Act.#bcpoli #cdnpoli
1. The Canadian province of Quebec had big plans of becoming the "battery of the U.S. northeast" by feeding power generated from its dams and other hydro plants to millions of people in Vermont, Massachusetts and New York state. Now, dry conditions that have affected energy output worldwide are forcing one of the world's largest hydropower producers to cut exports. "There wasn't enough snow or rain in the regions where we needed it," said Michael Sabia, chief executive of Hydro‑Québec, the provincial utility. "We can't make it rain, as much as we'd like to.&qu...
2. "Drought is a big concern," said Lei Xie, a researcher with the International Hydropower Association, a London-based nonprofit group. She said it is becoming more difficult for forecasters to model the extremes of climate change, and predict from year-to-year how much electricity local hydroelectric systems will generate. Canada bet heavily on hydro as a means of cleaning up its carbon footprint; it is the third-largest hydroelectricity producer in the world. But with the climate becoming markedly drier in recent years, Canada's utilities are now investing hundreds of billion...
Read 9 tweets
Lindsay Brown Profile picture
Jun 19, 2023
Had Bing Thom not died prematurely, he would have gone after @AIBCconnected for its gentleman's agreement rule that architects can't criticize other projects. Reportedly a certain major arch'l firm in Vancouver reported Bing to AIBC for his letter opposing #105Keefer. #vanpoli
@AIBCconnected Bing Thom intended to go after AIBC's muzzling rule & publicly ask them:

"What is the point of architecture if there's no discourse? What is the role of the architect in society? Do we have a public responsibility or are we just hired guns?"

AIBC's rule is destructive.
#bcpoli
@AIBCconnected Bing's death was a terrible loss for public discourse in Vancouver. BTW he also helped us with a fight I co-founded against the proposed downtown casino expansion (we beat the expansion partly thx to him). You could count on him to do the right thing. AIBC tries to block this.
Read 4 tweets
Lindsay Brown Profile picture
Jun 19, 2023
My elderly family member, whom I kept free of Covid for 3+ years but who finally caught in in an unmasked BC hospital last week, is very sick on Day 9. Rapid test still shows a bright red line. For health issues she can't take Paxlovid. She's in a rage at you, @adriandix. #bcpoli
@adriandix "I'm furious at the hospital and at all the unmasked healthcare workers, but I'm more outraged by @adriandix and Bonnie Henry. The govt is ultimately to blame."
@adriandix She asks: "Why aren't they following science?"

"They kept taking my mask off for tests and procedures - and they weren't even wearing masks when they did it."
Read 6 tweets
Lindsay Brown Profile picture
Jun 9, 2023
I’m a rural BC hospital taking an elderly relative to ER. No masks on staff & visitors but aggressive efforts to make everyone sanitize their hands, despite the fact that the diseases helping to crash the health system are airborne. We are truly living in an age of disinformation
*I’m IN a rural BC hospital. I am not a hospital. But you got that
Look at the handwashing fixation of @IPACCanada & the blindness to airborne transmission & masking stretching back many years. Every year they suggest infection control is largely a handwashing issue. It's as if all the airborne diseases do not exist. Why?
Read 11 tweets

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