(Opinion) Bear Flat Dispatch: ‘Disposable’ Site C work camp highlights need to avoid megaprojects

FORT ST. JOHN, B.C. — Recently it came to light that after less than 10 years, the big expensive work camp at Site C may be destined for a landfill. 

This has been a shock to everyone, including the PRRD, who did not see this coming until a contractor asked about space in the regional landfill. 

It does raise a lot of questions. I am no expert, but is it normal practice to simply dispose of a camp after one use on a megaproject? Can they not be designed to better adapt to future possible uses? Should there not have been a plan in place from the outset?   

The devil would be in the details, but one would think there is a better way to handle this.

We live in a province with an affordable housing shortage and a homeless person crisis, and taxpayer money is being spent in efforts to address both of those problems.

Now we also have taxpayers (or ratepayers) covering the cost to dispose of a camp. We live in a world of finite resources where the importance of recycling and re-purposing is highlighted.  However, despite all of that, now we are told that the only solution might be to landfill the camp.

I closely followed the Environmental Assessment Hearings for Site C, and I don’t remember this ever coming up.  This sure puts another nail in the coffin of the ‘Site C clean energy’ sales job we were all force-fed.

Megaprojects like Site C come with a lot of hidden cost and waste, and work camps are just one part of that.

Fortunately, when it comes to electrical generation projects to feed into the BC Hydro grid, we can mostly avoid megaprojects if we choose to. 

Small-scale distributed generation projects spread across the province can invigorate employment for local workers who can go home to their families at night. 

Where possible, we should endeavour to reduce the need for projects with fly-in fly-out workers and multi-million-dollar disposable camps. 

The hard part will be finding politicians who can resist the lobby pressuring tactics of the powerful special interest groups who salivate over the potential for lucrative public contracts that accompany megaprojects.