Premier David Eby toured the Site C dam this week, now named after his predecessor, John Horgan. Marvelling at the massive concrete structure, Eby said “Wow. Very Star Wars.”

But while the BC NDP was once part of the rebel alliance that opposed the dam, they are now firmly on the side of the Empire — in this case, an American fossil fuel empire moving in to take over B.C.’s public power.

That power is literal. You can feel it, driving over the W.A.C. Bennett Dam – one of the world’s largest earth-filled structures, holding back a reservoir bigger than any other lake in B.C.

You can hear it, in the blades of wind turbines as tall as office buildings, the crackle of transmission lines and the constant roar of compressor stations pushing gas through pipelines.

And you can smell it in northern towns like Taylor and Kitimat, where flare stacks burn 24/7 atop huge factories that process fracked methane gas for export.

It’s that ocean of gas under northeast B.C. and Alberta that has tickled the nostrils of Wall Street CEOs with close ties to Donald Trump. But it’s our hydro and wind power they need to get it out.

Eby is eager to oblige, promising deeply discounted electricity to the American-owned Ksi Lisims LNG proposal. This, after the public spent $16 billion to build the John Horgan dam.

Prime Minister Mark Carney has pledged another $3.9 billion in federal money for transmission lines to Ksi Lisims. But Carney is going much further to help his friends on Wall Street.

Ottawa is now the driving force behind Ksi Lisims LNG, drumming up customers, equity investors and public loans for a project the private sector considers too risky to finance.

We can still torpedo this American death star, save billions in taxpayer money, and reclaim B.C.’s power – our affordable, renewable electricity – to build the clean economy we deserve.

But first we have to stop our public institutions from handing our money to the evil empire. That includes band councils, Crown corporations and now, Canada’s pension funds.