Site C work camp to close March 31, future of facility unclear

Listen to this article

Estimated 3 minutes

The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results.

After more than a decade in operation, the half-billion-dollar Site C work camp on the hills of the Peace River near Fort St. John will close on March 31.

Questions remain about the future of the facility’s assets, which includes 21 three-storey dorms, a movie theatre, gymnasium, fitness centre and cafeteria.

“Our priority for the Site C camp remains repurposing as many assets as possible at another location and minimizing waste,” Site C community relations manager Bob Gammer told CBC News by email. 

“We remain confident that we will be able to achieve this.”

It’s not clear who might take the camp, where it will go, or how the facility will be repurposed.

CBC News has learned B.C. Hydro signed a letter of intent with one prospective buyer last fall.

“In the end it didn’t materialize,” Gammer said.

He says B.C. Hydro has been assessing whether relocating the facility for its own future purposes is practical.

“We have been studying a number of options about the future of the camp, which includes work dating back to 2023 when we began a market sounding process to gauge interest from external organizations,” Gammer said. 

Last April, it was reported that if no buyers were found, the camp might be sent to a nearby landfill owned and operated by the Peace River Regional District. 

“That would be the end of the North Peace landfill. It would be done,” district chair Brad Sperling told CBC News in an interview in September 2025.

Sperling expects it would cost $10 million to $20 million to build a new landfill if the camp was disposed in the regional district’s landfill.

He said it’s a capital cost they can’t afford upfront, and recommends the camp be dismantled for scrap metal dealers, concrete recyclers and salvage companies. 

More than 100 parties previously expressed interest  in the camp, including First Nations, an addictions recovery centre and tourism operators.

The North Winds Wellness Centre in Pouce Coupe, 70 kilometres southeast of Site C, is seeking to create an Indigenous-led health-care and trades training facility, and is continuing to lobby for the camp.

The Peace River Regional District received a letter from the centre explaining its proposal at their March 19 board meeting.

“Without decisive action, the window for repurposing will close permanently,” wrote North Winds executive director Isaac Hernandez.

Subscribe to CBC’s Fort St. John Weekly for a roundup of the best news and stories from B.C.’s Peace and Northern Rockies.