As the Site C hydroelectric dam nears completion, leaders in Fort St. John and the region expect steady growth to continue in sectors like natural gas and forestry.
Despite the departure of many Site C workers and a sawmill closure by Canfor Corp., local officials hope to achieve economic development, attract workers and their families to the region and ensure a high quality of life.
The Site C dam “is in a big transition time right now,” said Tiffany Hetenyi, executive director of the Fort St. John and District Chamber of Commerce. “It’s definitely impacting our economy.”
When fully online in 2025, the $16 billion Site C dam on the Peace River, 14 kilometres southwest of Fort St. John, will have a generating capacity of 1,100 megawatts.
While the dam’s construction has been a boon for the regional economy, employing 6,069 employees at its peak in June 2023, that dwindled to 2,993 this summer, and just 30 to 40 workers will be on site overseeing operations.
BC Hydro said construction contributed $130 million to regional GDP, with 2,200 workers housed in the project’s full-amenity camp and the rest booked into hotels and rentals in Fort St. John.
Peace River North MLA Dan Davies is optimistic about successor projects to the dam, which drew 22 per cent of its workers from the Peace region.
“We’ve seen a lot of activity in the natural gas sector,” Davies told Western Investor while campaigning for re-election last month. “We’ve got LNG Canada coming online, Woodfibre LNG is underway, the Cedar LNG project got approved, the Ksi Lisims LNG project north of Prince Rupert has been approved.”
Hetenyi pointed to Enbridge’s Sunrise Expansion Program, currently awaiting regulatory approval with a targeted in-service date of late 2028. Petronas Energy Canada Ltd. is also considering plans for the region. Meanwhile, energy safety could be another area where skills transfer as the region’s workers look beyond heavy industry and become entrepreneurs.
Forestry faces uncertainties
In a Sept. 4 news release, Canfor announced the closing of its Plateau and Fort St. John operations, impacting about 500 employees and removing 670 million board feet of annual production capacity from its B.C. operations. It attributed the closure to “the persistent challenge accessing economic fibre, ongoing financial losses, weak lumber markets and increased U.S. tariffs.”
Hetenyi said more than two dozen contract loggers in the region are impacted by the latest Canfor closure, and the outlook for them is uncertain.
“The loggers here are going to have to figure out what to do with their logs,” she said. “It used to be you could just operate in Fort St. John, but now it’s looking like they will have to go to Prince George, five or six hours or farther.”
Davies said the forestry sector should be modernized for the benefit of all stakeholders, including First Nations.
“All the First Nations, they want to be working, they want to do what’s best for their communities,” he said. “There’s definitely a path forward.”
Working with investors
Local leaders are working hard to make northern B.C. a place where individuals can grow up, start families, receive a good education, earn a good wage, enjoy recreational activities and retire.
Fort St. John Mayor Lilia Hansen pointed out that local home prices are significantly more affordable than in the Lower Mainland. In September 2024, the average sale price of a home in Fort St. John was $324,000 compared to $1.1 million in Metro Vancouver.
Hansen said a wealth of resources, including natural gas, makes Fort St. John attractive to investors and developers. For affected forestry workers, she said the local community is coming together to provide employment connections, matchmaking, job fairs, continuing education and grant funding for new businesses.
Site C “had a lot of skilled trades on site, and in our area there’s other businesses that will absorb them if we have the opportunity to,” said Hansen.
“There’s a lot of workers who would fly in, and they have families back home, but for anyone from the Peace region, there’s other businesses that are eagerly looking to hire them.”
