LNG will destroy B.C.’s climate targets
Re: “B.C. to offer tax breaks in drive to cut emissions,” Dec. 6.
Premier John Horgan is in the peculiar position of lauding the development of LNG facilities at Sarita Bay and Kitimat on the one hand and then proudly announcing the B.C. climate plan. This new climate plan purportedly will reduce emissions by 25.2 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents by 2030 and an additional 13 MTs by 2040. When in full operation the LNG operations will liquefy 50 MTs of natural gas. What impact will this have on B.C.’s climate plan?
Since more than 2,000 megawatts of electricity would be required to liquefy the natural gas (note that Site C will only produce 1,100 megawatts) it is more than likely that natural gas will be burned to produce the electricity required for liquefaction. Thus, an additional 5 MTs or so of methane will be required and this will be burned, thereby releasing 13.75 MTs of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Drilling and obtaining the natural gas in northeastern B.C. will result in the release of an additional 2.75 MTs carbon dioxide or so present in the natural gas, as well as the release of 0.424 MTs of fugitive methane. Over a 20-year period, methane has a global warming impact 85 times that of carbon dioxide.
The B.C. target for 2040 is a total release of no more than 25.5 MTs of CO2eqs. The CO2eqs released just by the two LNG plants comes to 52.5 MTs. Has our premier tumbled down the rabbit hole?
Bernhard H.J. Juurlink
Mill Bay
Canada must make a supreme effort
Re: “Children go on strike for climate crisis,” letter, Dec. 5.
I hope that people took the time to read this 12-year-old’s letter. I am approaching 85 years old and I totally agree with her words, even though I have enjoyed driving vehicles and burning gasoline and oil for a large portion of that time.
My hope is that the political parties, not only in B.C. but across all of Canada, wake up to the obvious knowledge that we are polluting the air we breathe every minute of every day.
If Canada makes a supreme effort to stop burning fossil fuels or even cutting the use of them by 50 per cent, then perhaps the rest of the world might follow suit. Only then will we possibly save mankind from extinction. If we do not work globally to do so, this planet will be likely become a dead planet.
Derk Rennie
Victoria
Gas is cheaper than electricity in B.C.
When I listened to Wednesday’s news conference featuring Premier John Horgan and Green Party Leader Andrew Weaver outlining and promoting the province’s new long-term plans for implementing the use of clean B.C. energy, both failed to mention that it is currently cheaper to heat a home with dirty oil or natural gas than it is using B.C.’s abundant supply of clean, green electrical energy.
Puzzling, isn’t it?
Bruce Cline
Victoria
Tap water can burn like fire
Re: “Beware of lowering water temperature,” letter Dec. 1.
A home hot-water temperature of 49 to 52 C saves not only energy but also lives. The temperature advocated by the letter-writer can burn like fire.
If exposed to 60 C water, a young child’s skin will be severely burned in less than five seconds, but at 49 C, it will take more than two minutes. Annually, Canada has recorded up to 150 severe injuries to young children and another 150 experienced by the elderly and individuals with disabilities.
In the United States, manufacturers of hot-water tanks have been pre-setting hot-water tanks at 49 C for more than 30 years.
Tap-water scalds are well documented in the peer-reviewed scientific literature as a source of deaths and injuries, while domestic hot-water-tank-acquired legionella infections much less so. Major outbreaks of legionellosis continue to be primarily from commercial cooling towers and less frequently from sources such as hot tubs.
Health Canada supports temperature reductions in hot water tanks to 49°C to reduce scald burn injuries. However, people with a weakened immune system, lung and respiratory problems, or organ transplants should check with their doctors before reducing the temperature of the water in their homes.
The decision on lowering domestic hot-water tank settings should be left to the individual. However, that determination should have the benefit of a full presentation of the risks and benefits.
Richard Stanwick, MD
Victoria
Narrow-minded minority censors song
Re: “Radio stations give song the cold shoulder,” Dec. 5.
I listened to a radio discussion on the song Baby It’s Cold Outside and read the Times Colonist article on the same subject. What are we coming to, to be controlled and censored by a narrow-minded minority?
It’s a very musical song, especially with the right singers, which is more than one can say about most of the modern songs. The minority are reading a meaning in the lyrics that was never intended by the composers, who often performed it themselves, as man and wife.
In the film, the singers reverse roles halfway through and it becomes a song that the woman is singing to the man. Are we now going to go through the lyrics of all the incomparable songs composed by such greats as Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cole Porter, George Gershwin and others to find an unintended meaning?
Ed Buscall
Brentwood Bay
Young people already are taking the bus
Re: “You might pay for metered parking on Sunday,” Dec. 6.
So now, Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps is proposing to eliminate free downtown parking on Sundays, and put the revenue toward youth bus passes. She thinks that this will encourage those of young driving age to use public transit as their first choice, rather than driving.
News flash: They are already doing so. Our children’s generation (we have two daughters) have made that choice already, finding driving costs too high, and a driver’s licence more difficult to obtain. They don’t need more encouragement.
Either the mayor is ignorant of this, or she chooses to disregard it as she pursues her anti-car agenda. The result will be to provide one more reason for shoppers to avoid downtown.
Brian Kendrick
Fairfield
