Cortes Currents

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents -In yesterday’s broadcast, Jennifer Lash, a former senior advisor from Environment and Climate Change Canada, explained that  the Prime Minister had to make an MOU with Alberta in order to bring that province on board to initiate further climate initiatives. The potential cost was building a pipeline across BC, but she believes the opposition in BC is too strong for this to become a reality. She also talked about other past and present Liberal environmental policies. Max Thaysen from Cortes Island’s Climate Action Network responds in this morning’s interview.

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - The first thing that comes to mind when thinking of Justin Trudeau’s environmental policy is often either purchasing the Trans Mountain Pipeline (TMX) or expanding Canada’s LNG sector. Yet Jennifer Lash, a former senior advisor with Environment and Climate Change Canada, speaks of his accomplishments in the fight against climate change. In this morning’s interview, she explains the rationale behind Liberal environmental policies. As it is actually quite simple once you get the underlying theme, Cortes Currents is calling it ‘Liberal Environmental Policies for Dummies.’

Jennifer Lash: “There’s two ways that you can address climate change. One is through the policies that reduce the emissions here in Canada, and the other is by taking action to leave fossil fuels in the ground so that they're not even extracted.”

“Both approaches have merit, so I'm not here to just say whether one is right or wrong. Both are out there, and there is a substantial part of society that's very concerned about how much fossil fuels we're taking out of the ground. When TMX was purchased, that provided space for the oil sands to expand.”

“When LNG is approved, it obviously increases the extraction of LNG, which is then burned in other countries. We're all trying to meet our Paris targets; that doesn't count emissions burned in other countries. So with the Paris Agreement, we are responsible for the emissions that we generate here in Canada. When the LNG is exported and burned in China, China has to account for those emissions. It's just the math of how the system works. As a major oil and gas supplier globally, Canada has a moral responsibility for how much fossil fuels we put into the system.”

“There is also the argument that at this moment in time, if we leave our LNG in the ground, another country is going to take it. So it's not like global emissions are, or the global supply of LNG is going to go down. It's going to go up. It's just that we leave it in the ground and don't have the economic benefit, and another country does. That's just the lay of the land of the issues that surround the climate debate.”

“When Trudeau came into power, he and his various environment ministers—Minister McKenna, Minister Wilkinson, and then Minister Guilbeault—all played a part in delivering these policies. They put together the first national climate plan, which was designed to reduce our emissions. We call it the PCF, the Pan-Canadian Framework on Climate Change and the Economy.”

“The ability to get all the provinces to sign onto that—namely to get Alberta to sign onto that—required a pipeline. So that was the first grand bargain that the Liberal government did with Alberta. You can say it was really bad to get TMX, and I'm leaving out all the ocean risk issues—that's a whole other interview as a threat to the ocean—but in terms of climate, the pipeline was approved in order for us to get a national climate plan, which we did get.”

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - On Saturday, December 6, more than three dozen people gathered for the grand opening of ithe Cortes Wood Makerspace, in Mansons Landing.

Shopmaster Hannu Huuskonen explained,   “A lot of people need to do stuff in a woodworking shop and not everyone needs to build themselves a shop, especially big enough to do certain things with it properly equipped. It's a big outlay of money. So it makes total sense to have people be able to come to a common space.

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents -Work on the Heriot Bay and Whaletown ferry terminals is proceeding faster than expected, and the much-anticipated shutdown of service on the Cortes to Quadra run has been shortened to three weeks. Cortes Island’s new hydroelectric ferry could arrive as early as late spring or summer of 2026. The Cortes and Campbell River ferries could both be fully electric earlier than previously expected. The key word for both of those last items is ‘could’ because they are possibilities, not promises. In this morning’s interview, Sheila Reynolds from BC Ferries gave Cortes Currents an update on the scheduling for our area.

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents -The Friends of Cortes Island (FOCI) needs to raise $15,000 for core operations, and is also inviting the community to their Annual General Meeting on Tuesday, December 9, at 5 PM, at Manson’s Hall. 

FOCI’s Executive Director, Helen Hall, explained, “We all live on this beautiful island which has rich forests, a stunning coastline and a host of endangered species, and  I think that's a big reason why people choose to live here -the natural beauty of the island. FOCI has a really important remit to protect and nurture that natural beauty for future generations.” 

Cortes Currents:  FOCI has just published its 2025 Annual Report—a look back at a year full of on-the-ground conservation and community projects. What have you been doing?

Helen Hall: 2025 was a very busy year for us. We have been doing everything from doing a whole island beach cleanup in the spring to maintaining all the regional parks and trails. We’ve helped create a really amazing wetland at the Cortes Island School. FOCI has been continuing to work on the Dillon Creek Wetland, which is helping to reduce the nutrients going into Hague and Gunflint Lakes.  We've also been doing some important marine work. FOCI just launched a program protecting the vital eelgrass beds around Cortes. We've been also working to try and prevent a very invasive species getting hold in Manson's Lagoon, which is the European green Crab.”

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - In the conclusion of a series about Canada’s MOU with Alberta, four local leaders delve deeper into specific issues: the pipeline itself; whether Canada needs British Columbia’s support; the proposed lifting of BC’s tanker moratorium; and an Angus Reid poll suggesting a slim majority of British Columbians may be in favour of the MOU.

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - Canada’s MOU with Alberta, a proposed new pipeline in British Columbia, and the possible lifting of the tanker ban have been hot news items over the past few days. Steven Guilbeault resigned from cabinet over his opposition to the way Prime Minister Mark Carney is handling these issues. In the first episode of a two part series about the MOU, Cortes Currents asked two politicians and two environmental leaders for their take on these events.

Green Party leader Elizabeth May;

Jennifer Lash, a former senior analyst with Environment and Climate Change Canada and the 2025 LIberal candidate for North Island–Powell River.

Shelley Luce, Associate Director and Campaigns Director at Sierra Club BC;

Max Thaysen, a leader of the Cortes Island Climate Action Network and  regional representative for North Island on the BC NDP’s Standing Committee on Economy and Environment.

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - The Cortes Community Mapping Project recently launched its Cortes Island Map Series in Linnaea’s Lakeview Room. This morning’s program consists of gleanings from the three speakers: Sabina Leader Mense, David Shipway and Eve Flager. 

Sabina Leader Mense: “I want to give you a little bit of background on how we got this project started. In a nutshell, the project is best described as putting community maps into community hands. That’s been our goal. I’m just one of the team members working on this project.

Eve Flager, whom you’ll be hearing from shortly, is our GIS (Geographic Information System) analyst. David Shipway is the keeper of maps on Cortes and has been a big part of this project. Sonya Friesen, ground-truther extraordinaire, has been working with us. Maya Buckner, who is not here, was born and raised on Cortes and is a newly accredited GIS analyst through Vancouver Island University. So we have our own resident analyst mentored by Eve. We’re in a really good position to move forward with our maps.

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - A growing number of countries are experimenting with ways to integrate electric vehicle batteries and rooftop solar systems into their energy grids to enhance stability. While BC Hydro is conducting trials with EV batteries in the Lower Mainland, the utility’s current emphasis is on rewarding customers who reduce their energy consumption during evening peak periods. In today’s interview, Brandon Young, Director of Energy Efficiency and Innovation at BC Hydro, discusses the Peak Saver program and possible next steps for integrating residential customers into grid-stability initiatives.

 Brandon Young: “There’s two main avenues for customers to participate:”

“They can participate behaviourally. What we do over a course of generally a winter period, is ‘call events.’ We send them an email or text message prior to an event, which generally takes place during the evening for about four hours. If those customers are able to reduce their usage by 20% over the four hours, they redeem a $3 reward. Over the course of the season, those rewards add up.”

“The other avenue is they are also able to automatically enrol devices. Most of those are smart thermostats for baseboard heaters and during those events that allows us to automatically turn down the thermostat a couple degrees achieving the savings we need. For a thermostat, they'll receive $50 a year. We also have seasonal amounts for level two chargers if they have electric vehicles as well as batteries. Batteries can be up to $250 per season.”

For BC Hydro, the program reduces peak demand and helps defer or avoid capital investments needed to meet growing electricity needs.

Brandon Young: “W e have almost 150,000 customers participating across the province. The majority of those are behavioral, but definitely a growing number of customers on the enrollment side and a really high satisfaction rate. Less than 1% of customers that enrol choose to no longer participate.” 

Cortes Currents:  What about people with solar and batteries?

Brandon Young: “Self-generation and net metering are designed to reduce a home’s reliance on the grid, and battery storage can help during peak periods. Eligible home batteries can be enrolled in Peak Saver whether or not a customer has solar panels. By allowing the home to rely on its battery during the four-hour event window, customers can earn $250 per season.” 

Cortes Currents: Residential battery customers (with or without solar) are assured that peak saving events will not exceed four hours, during which their batteries will not go below 20% of capacity. They will retain manual override of their batteries throughout this period and at the end of the four hours the device will return to its normal settings.

“BC Hydro also offers incentives of up to $5,000 for residential battery installations. If a battery is eligible for Peak Saver enrolment, a customer may receive a $500 enrolment bonus and $250 each year thereafter. Over ten years, that could total $2,500, helping to offset bills or initial installation costs.” 

Germany’s path toward a net-zero grid is expected to include leveraging parked EVs whose batteries are often unused during the day. BC Hydro has not yet scaled two-way, vehicle-to-grid energy flows for mass market use, but the utility is running trials—particularly with short-range commercial fleets. 

Young explained,  “Right now we have a pretty substantive trial with Lynch bus line school buses in the Lower Mainland, where they charge in our off peak periods and then again can inject power back to the grid during peak, reducing that peak demand.”

“We do have a number of shorter range distribution cargo companies as well. Longer term, one of our bigger pieces is for sure looking at scaling to mass market or residential customers as well.”

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents -In 2015, the year Justin Trudeau was elected Prime Minister of Canada, more than 5 million Canadians were living in poverty. This number came down every year until 2020, when Canada reached its goal of cutting the number of people living below the poverty line by 50%. However, a new report from the Auditor General of Canada states this was ‘mainly due to the emergency benefits the government temporarily provided because of the COVID-19 pandemic.’ Thanks to inflation and the phasing out of these benefits, close to 4 million Canadians were once again living in poverty by 2023. According to the 2025 Hunger Count, put out by Food Banks Canada, the situation has deteriorated since then. In today’s story, Angelica Raaen from the Cortes Food Bank described what poverty looks like on a remote island.