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BCers to Province: Stop the Senseless Water Giveaway
BCers to Province: Stop the Senseless Water Giveaway
Surrey residents pay $1,630 per million litres; why not Nestle or frackers?
“The province is not seeking to make a profit from water.” — BC Environment Minister Mary Polak
No kidding — not at $2.25 per million litres of cold, clean B.C. water!
But seriously minister, do you think that waiting till 2016 just to start charging multinational giant Nestle, other water bottlers, oil and gas frackers, amusement parks, garbage dumps and everyone else who wants millions of litres of water is appropriate?
Because tens of thousands of British Columbians are outraged their province will be giving away water for pennies. And until then it’s free.
Forget about making a profit — when Nestle can buy their 265 million litres for $596.25 — you aren’t even covering the cost of government writing up and mailing the invoice!
And Polak is actually proud of it.
“We don’t sell water. We charge administration fees for the management of that resource,” she toldthe Legislature in February without any hint of irony.
But Surrey residents pay $1.63 per 1,000 litres at home; at those rates Nestle would instead be paying $1,630 per million litres and over $431,950 for what it bottled last year.
And Vancouver’s flat water rate for non-metered houses is $568 this year.
Drought, outrage set in
So the Nestle giveaway is why last week’s column went viral.
And it’s also why a petition from consumer activists SumOfUs.org has over 200,000 signatures demanding B.C. charge higher water rates.
But there’s a faint hope clause — the B.C. Legislature just returned for an emergency sitting to pass laws allowing Petronas to develop its liquefied natural gas project.
If the BC Liberal government cared as much about B.C. water as they obviously do about LNG we could get the water rates increased in less than a week with opposition party cooperation.
Water is in exceedingly short supply as the heat wave and drought continue to force more H2O restrictions.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Metro Vancouver air quality comparable to Beijing
Health authorities advise caution due to smoke from hundreds of wildfires across B.C.
Smoke from wildfires in the Interior of British Columbia blankets the Lions Gate Bridge in Vancouver. Health officials in the province have issued air quality warnings as a result of the fires. (Jonathan Hayward/Canadian Press)
Health authorities say Metro Vancouver’s air quality has dipped to levels close to those found in major Chinese polluted cities such as Beijing, and are warning residents to stay indoors, due in part to the rampant wildfires in B.C.
“I would say that the air quality that we’ve experienced recently [in B.C.] and are experiencing now is unfortunately something that residents in a lot of cities in China experience on quite a regular basis, which I think is quite concerning because these are certainly levels that pose a risk for human health and well-being,” said Fraser Health medical health officer Dr. Lisa Mu.
- B.C. fires: smoky skies and how to avoid them
- B.C. wildfires: what you need to know
- B.C. wildfires blanket province in smoke
The string of forest fires currently burning in the province forced Environment Canada to issue air quality advisories on Monday for several areas, including Metro Vancouver.
The sharp decrease in air quality is mostly due to small particles from the fires, which can irritate people’s lungs.
The highest concentration of particulate matter in the air has been found in North Burnaby, where levels are not far behind those in Beijing. The sprawling Chinese city is notorious for its poor air quality. It’s often engulfed in smog for days on end as China contends with rampant air pollution stemming from its decades of economic growth.
Particulate matter numbers:
- Beijing: 144 µg/m3
- Burnaby north: 112 µg/m3
- Vancouver: 60.1 µg/m3
- Abbotsford: 58 µg/m3
- Paris: 56 µg/m3
Note: These figures are accurate for 7 p.m. PT on Monday. Source: Air Quality B.C.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Why B.C. may be in for a long, hot summer
A dry spring, a warmer than usual Pacific Ocean, and an El Niño means the hot weather could be here to stay
Whenever temperatures approach 30 C in Metro Vancouver, it’s a talker.
While the thermostat does get close once or twice each summer, this particular heat wave has a lot of added factors. First of all, it’s early, as seasonal highs for Vancouver right now are just 20 C.
And the forecast temperatures will likely end up 10 degrees above that this weekend — numbers more reminiscent of July or August.
This heat wave will also be intense. Temperatures will steadily climb right across southern B.C. over the next few days, peaking on Sunday at 30 degrees for the South Coast and approaching the 40s in the Interior.
Daily temperature records will fall, but so too will many all-time hottest June day records. It looks like we will, at least, get close for places like Vancouver (30.6 C), Kelowna (38 C) and Kamloops (39.1 C).
Finally, this heat is just the latest ‘extreme’ in what has been an incredibly warm and dry year overall. Most of B.C. is coming out of a winter of record low snow packs.
Long range forecast calls for hot summer
This past May was the driest on record for most of the province. So far, just a fraction of expected June rain has fallen. And in general, temperatures have been above seasonal for weeks on end.
This provides that much more of an impact for the hot weather forecast when it comes to fire danger and drought concerns. After an explosive start to the fire season, and reservoirs dropping at an alarming speed, a dry forecast ramps up the danger and a hot one means evaporation of any moisture happens at a faster rate.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Canadian Mortgage Insurer Tells US Hedge Funds Why Canada’s Housing Bubble Is Immortal. Hilarity Ensues
Canadian Mortgage Insurer Tells US Hedge Funds Why Canada’s Housing Bubble Is Immortal. Hilarity Ensues
Home prices in Canada’s two largest metro areas have been red-hot for years. In May, the average selling price for all types of homes in the Greater Toronto Area jumped 11% from a year ago to C$649,600 on a 6% increase in sales. In Greater Vancouver, the composite benchmark price for all homes rose 9.4% to C$684,400 on a 23% increase in sales.
But these overall price changes paper over what’s happening with detached homes,whose prices soared 14% to C$1,104,900 in Vancouver and 18% to C$1,115,120 in Toronto.
Already last summer, Fitch fretted about overvaluation in housing and the high debt burden relative to disposable income of Canadian households. At about the same time, seven in ten mortgage lenders expressed concerns in a poll by FICO that home prices were in a “bubble” that could burst any time. Last October, the Bank of Canada thought that the housing bubble could threaten Canada’s financial stability.
This January, Deutsche Bank estimated that homes in Canada were 63% overvalued. In March, the IMF warned that high household debt levels and the “overheated housing market” are two risks it would “need to keep an eye on.” In April, the Economistdetermined that home prices in Canada were overvalued by 35% when compared to incomes, and 89% when compared to rents.
Now hedge funds are trying to engineer ways to short the Canadian housing market one way or the other, because surely this would be another “short of a lifetime.”
Maybe they’re right: beyond Toronto and Vancouver, the housing market is already drifting lower.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
House prices may stay high in Canada: Here’s why
Seemingly insatiable overseas demand is one of main reasons the gloom-mongers have been wrong
If you’ve been listening to all the warnings from foreign banks about a Canadian house price crash, that sounds smart. But before you congratulate my chum on her forethought, you should know she made that decision several years ago.
- Average house price in Canada up 9.5% to 448, 862
- Ontario house prices may be 25% overvalued, Fitch says
Of course, since then Toronto house prices have only continued their dramatic rise. Although Toronto and Vancouver lead the way with soaring real estate, prices in many other Canadian cities continue to rise.
In the face of a series of recent reports of houses selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars over their asking prices, I thought it a good time to look at why all the gloom-mongers have been wrong, and why they may still be wrong. At least for a while yet.
The question is no small matter for older boomers trying to capture the value of their homes. For most Canadians a home is their single biggest asset.
People heading into retirement could have their plans seriously upset if house prices fell by 63 per cent, as one international bank projectedearlier this year.
On the other hand, if prices continue to rise by nearly 10 per cent a year, as they did this year, it would be difficult for boomers to find a more lucrative, tax-free income on an investment worth up to a million dollars.
Boomers aren’t the only ones watching this market. New buyers would be even worse affected.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Short-Sighted Politicians Are Fuelling Canada’s Housing Crisis
Short-Sighted Politicians Are Fuelling Canada’s Housing Crisis
Many homeowners in Vancouver and Toronto have become “equity-millionaires” in the last few years due to unusually high appreciation of their homes thanks to persistently strong demand by foreign investors, mostly from China. In their haste to park their money overseas in a hurry, most of them don’t even bother to make a trip to view their investments. The Wall Street Journal article, “The Mechanics of Moving Cash Out of China,” reveals the clandestine, if not outright illegal ways that wealthy mainland Chinese are bringing their funds to Hong Kong, and from there on to other parts of the world. Most of it ends up invested in their favourite foreign destinations — the US, Australia, and Canada. It is a crime for any mainland Chinese to bring more than $50,000 out of the country, but many wealthy Chinese are, nonetheless, smuggling out billions.
Transfer of money from Hong Kong to Canada is legal, but no one is really paying attention to its origin. It seems that for the B.C. Premier, our Federal Finance Minister Joe Oliver, and our Prime Minister Stephen Harper, the influx of dubiously obtained money from China is of little concern. In fact, judging from their latest comments, they seem to be quite content with it. A CTV News report from May 14 quoted Prime Minister Harper as saying that limiting foreign investment in housing is not something he is “contemplating at the current time.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Trans Mountain pipeline expansion ‘disastrous,’ says Mayor Gregor Robertson
‘My mind is clearly made up. I think this is a bad deal for Vancouver,’ he said after reading new report
Mayor Gregor Robertson says new evidence proves the expansion of Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain pipeline presents a grave threat to the City of Vancouver’s health, economy and environment.
The city commissioned expert reports on the potential impacts of the $5.4-billion proposal and the findings were presented to council on Wednesday.
“Today we heard overwhelming evidence that the Kinder Morgan pipeline proposal and the oil tankers associated with it are incredibly disastrous for Vancouver,” said Robertson outside council chambers after the meeting.
“My mind is clearly made up. I think this is a bad deal for Vancouver.”
The mayor entered a motion to reaffirm the city’s opposition to the project, but council agreed to defer the vote for two weeks after Coun. Elizabeth Ball requested more time to review the findings.
NEB considering proposal
The National Energy Board is considering Kinder Morgan’s plan to triple its bitumen-carrying capacity to 890,000 barrels a day by laying almost 1,000 kilometres of new pipe near an existing line between Alberta and Burnaby, B.C.
The city submitted its expert evidence to the energy board on Wednesday, including critical reports on the project’s economic viability, risk assessment and potential spill impacts.
A Metro Vancouver-commissioned report on health and air quality concluded a spill could expose up to a million people to toxic benzene fumes and kill up to 100,000 birds.
The report said benzene, a component of diluted bitumen, can cause headaches, dizziness, nausea, respiratory problems, coma and even death. People on the Stanley Park seawall next to the water could suffer irreversible health effects, it said.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Four Things We May Never Know About the Vancouver Fuel Spill
Four Things We May Never Know About the Vancouver Fuel Spill
Total volume, how the Kits coast guard would respond, and two more big
Late Saturday afternoon, Transport Canada officially clearedthe MV Marathassa to leave Canadian waters, weeks after the ship spilled an undetermined amount of fuel into Burrard Inlet.
As it exits the Salish Sea, the bulk carrier leaves angry mayors, a combative coast guard, a distrustful public and many, many questions in its wake. Here are four things we don’t know — and may never know — about what happened in English Bay.
1. What is the total spill volume?
In his first press conference after the spill, Cmdr. Roger Girouard of the Canadian Coast Guard stated the volume of the spill was 2,700 litres. He reiterated this point during subsequent media appearances, and Industry Minister James Moore echoed his comments.
Vancouver city manager Penny Ballem disputes the claim. In a recent presentation to Vancouver’s city council, she pegged the real volume somewhere between 3,000 and 5,000 litres.
Then there’s the amount recovered. The day after the spill, Cmdr. Girouard reported cleanup crews had recovered about 1,400 litres of fuel. A few days later, Coast Guard Commissioner Jody Thomas said cleanup crews recovered 80 per cent of fuel spilled within 36 hours.
According to the president of a B.C. oil spill prevention and response planning firm, recovering between 10 and 15 per cent of conventional oil spilled in seawater is a “best case” scenario. Bunker C fuel — the product spilled in English Bay — is not conventional: it is denser, more viscous and heavier than conventional crude. Unlike conventional oil, bunker C fuel is not certain to floatnor does it weather and dissolve as easily.
On average only five to 10 per cent of the bunker C fuel will evaporate within 24 hours. Instead it breaks into tarballs and settles lower in the water column — sometimes as far as one to three metres below the surface.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Canada Housing, Office Market Mauled by Oil, Layoffs – but Vancouver Bubble Still Soars
Canada Housing, Office Market Mauled by Oil, Layoffs – but Vancouver Bubble Still Soars
Back in December, the Bank of Canada said home prices were overvalued by as much as 30% and posed an “elevated” risk to the Canadian financial system. In January, Deutsche Bank found that Canada’s housing market was, more realistically, 63% overvalued.
In greater Vancouver, the “benchmark” price of all types of homes (detached, townhouse, and apartment) in March rose 7.2% from a year ago to C$660,700, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver. Detached homes jumped 11.2% to C$1.05 million; and in Vancouver West, 12.3% to a breathtaking C$2.4 million.
Those are the Board’s “benchmark” prices. The average price for detached homes in Vancouver soared 16% from a year ago, surpassing $1.4 million for the first time. Transactions skyrocketed 54%; supply plunged 15%. Prices were doped by low interest rates, limited supply, and foreign investors. This market is hot.
But the oil patch of Canada is skidding into serious trouble.
“The recent international price war over oil has demonstrated the risks and dangers of relying on energy revenue to fund public services,” Alberta’s government explained on Thursday, as it presented a C$43.4 billion budget for fiscal 2015/2016. It projects arevenue decline of C$5.6 billion!
It’s “simply irresponsible” to rely on unstable oil revenues “to fund health, education, and other vital public services that Albertans depend upon,” the government said.
And things would change. Energy revenue would from now on – if they ever return to prior levels – be treated as “windfall” that would at least in part go into savings. And there would be a slew of new taxes and fees, such as a bump in gasoline taxes, steeper income taxes for high-income earners, and a new health-care levy. With these measures, the government hopes to balance the budget three years from now.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
‘Corrections In Progress’ In Most Canadian Housing Markets: Teranet
‘Corrections In Progress’ In Most Canadian Housing Markets: Teranet
House prices fell in February in eight of 11 major housing markets measured by the Teranet/National Bank House Price Index.
“In some markets there have clearly been corrections in progress,” National Bank senior economist Marc Pinsonneault said in a statement.
“The monthly retreat in Calgary was the fourth in a row, for a cumulative decline of 2.3 per cent. In Winnipeg it was the fourth in five months, for a cumulative decline [of] 3 per cent.”
Prices fell 0.11 per cent in Toronto, but are still up 7.3 per cent from a year ago. Vancouver was one of the three cities to buck the trend, with prices up 1.46 per cent in February (an annual pace of around 18 per cent), and up 2.7 per cent from a year ago. Victoria and Hamilton are the other two cities seeing house price gains.
East of Toronto things look somewhat worse. Ottawa-Gatineau clocked the fastest decline in house prices in February, with house prices falling more than 2 per cent in February — an annual pace of some 24 per cent.
One aspect to note is that house price declines in Alberta’s cities were no worse than declines in other parts of the country, contrary to the sharper correction some economists had been calling for in the oil-exporting province.
The overall 11-city index was flat for the month. But thanks mostly to strength in house prices last year, prices in the 11 cities are still up by 4.4 per cent from a year ago.
This is where house prices are rising and falling across Canada.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Kinder Morgan Pipeline Protest Sees More People Arrested After Crossing Police Line
Kinder Morgan Pipeline Protest Sees More People Arrested After Crossing Police Line.
VANCOUVER – About a dozen more people have been arrested at a pipeline protest in a conservation area in Vancouver.
The protesters were taken away Saturday after crossing a police line on Burnaby Mountain, where crews have been conducting survey work for the proposed Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.
Arrests began at the site Thursday, four days after a court deadline passed for activists to leave the survey site.
Kinder Morgan, the company that’s proposing the expansion, says drilling has begun at one of two, 250-metre-deep holes and that work trucks, crews and their equipment will continue to move onto the mountain throughout the weekend.
If approved, the expanded pipeline could ship almost 900,000 barrels a day of crude from Alberta to the B.C. coast.
Opponents argue the increased quantity of oil being transported would increase the risk of a devastating spill.
Kinder Morgan Begins Survey Work On Burnaby Mountain As Protests Continue
Kinder Morgan Begins Survey Work On Burnaby Mountain As Protests Continue.
BURNABY, B.C. – First Nations vowed to stand in unity with protesters as police kept up arrests Friday in a Metro Vancouver conservation area where crews resumed survey work for the proposed Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.
Shortly after activists announced they would do whatever it takes to stymie the project, a group began marching up Burnaby Mountain in the pouring rain.
More arrests quickly followed.
Charlene Aleck, a Tsleil-Waututh councillor, told a gathering of protesters at the base of the mountain that members of her First Nations band would join the actions aimed at protecting their homeland and waters.
“For the Tsleil-Waututh nation, it is our sacred obligation,” she said to a cheering crowd. “In our shared opposition to Kinder Morgan, we are many people paddling one canoe. Our united opposition and the sum of our collective voices will ensure this pipeline is never built.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
