In an energy announcement at Clover Point Monday morning that was brimming with ebullient confidence, there was one factor that was downplayed.

It was the distinct whiff of anxiety about B.C.’s overall energy picture in the years ahead.

Premier David Eby announced an open-ended call for 5,000 gigawatt-hours per year of power (roughly another Site C’s worth) from large renewable projects. It was billed as a “forward-thinking, ambitious plan to drive growth and transformative change.”

Sounds great. But they did the same thing 13 months ago. B.C. Hydro and the energy minister of the day made the same ambitious call for more generation to create jobs and drive sustainable growth — and got three times the capacity it was asking for in the initial responses. B.C. Hydro said then that it expected to issue such calls for power every two years. The next one was expected in 2026.

Monday’s call is a year ahead of that schedule, almost twice as big as last year’s and there are no limits on project size this time. It is part of an even broader suite of measures to cope with future........

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