Media release
B.C. Citizens for Green Energy
www.greenenergybc.ca
June 6, 2008
VANCOUVER, JUNE 6, 2008 — The June 7 REV! 2008 (Ride Electric Vehicles) Annual Show in Burnaby demonstrates a positive approach to climate change, said B.C. Citizens for Green Energy co-spokesperson Gene Vickers. “We congratulate the Vancouver Electric Vehicle Association for promoting a clean transportation alternative,” he said. “But unless we end our reliance on imported coal-generated electricity, electric cars will just substitute one fossil fuel for another.”
B.C. currently imports around 15 per cent of its electricity, most of it from coal-generated plants in Alberta and Washington. Coal-generated electricity is the world’s worst source of greenhouse gases. Even if we conserve, BC Hydro predicts that our growing population will need up to 45 per cent more electricity over the next 20 years.
“If electric cars do prove to be the wave of the future, we’re going to need even more electricity,” said Vickers. “If it isn’t green, it won’t benefit our environment.”
Clean energy, on the other hand, will complement this emerging sector of clean transportation. “Wind, run of river, geothermal, wave, tidal — B.C. has so much potential that we could become an environmentally friendly counterpart to Alberta’s oil and gas industry.”
Environment Canada’s 2005 figures show that B.C.’s transportation sector generated 26 megatonnes of greenhouse gases. “Electric vehicles could replace a lot of gas-and diesel-burning engines, especially in urban areas like the Lower Mainland,” said Vickers. “And if Canada followed the European example of electrified railways, we could prevent an additional 6.5 million tonnes of GHGs.”
Vickers referred to a railway study by Glen Fisher that was recently summarized in the Montreal Gazette:
http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/story.html?id=550df15e-b05f-403e-b477-56261048f077&p=1
“All this shows incredible potential for an emerging sector of clean, renewable electricity,” said Vickers. “So we congratulate the Vancouver Electric Vehicle Association on their work and wish them well at tomorrow’s REV! 2008 event.”
REV! 2008 takes place on June 7, from 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., at Sprott Street and Kensington Avenue, just west of Burnaby Lake. Admission is free.
B.C. Citizens for Green Energy is not affiliated with the Vancouver Electric Vehicle Association. For more information on VEVA’s REV! 2008 event, visit: http://www.veva.bc.ca
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