Quote:
Originally Posted by Frequitude
I thought the Rio Tinto smelter was no longer operational for some reason.
Warning: pure cocktail napkin math to follow..
So going by those old numbers posted above and assuming they've dropped, call it $1 billion per year of economic export activity.
Add in a billion dollars of cleanup costs for one year (pure rounded up assumption on my part) and we're talking a $2 billion event.
Call a major spill a 1 in 50 year event and discount at 10% and its about a $400 million present cost.
...seems like a reasonable toll for the benefactors of the pipeline (Oil companies, pipeline companies, Alberta, Feds, etc.) to pool together on.
[/cocktail napkin math]
I fully support the creation of a cleanup fund, so long as the money actually goes into a discrete reserve fund and not into the general coffers of the BC government.
|
The concern is that none of those benefactors are the BC public, and they're the ones who are going to shoulder most of the burden if there is a spill.
As previously mentioned, this is a long ways from being over. We can probably expect a referendum in BC and then some drawn out court battles.