Definitions

"commission" means the British Columbia Utilities Commission under the Utilities Commission Act;

"gas" includes natural, manufactured and mixed gas and liquefied petroleum gas;

"gas utility" means a person that owns or operates in British Columbia equipment or facilities for the production, generation, storage, transmission, sale, delivery or furnishing of gas for the production of light, heat, cold or power to or for the public or a corporation for compensation, but does not include a company within the meaning of that word as defined in the National Energy Board Act (Canada);

"land" includes

(a) an easement or privilege in, to, on, under, over or in respect of land, and

(b) foreshore and land covered by water;

"owner" means a person who is registered in a land title office as the owner of land or of a charge on land, whether entitled to it in the person's own right or in a representative capacity or otherwise, and, subject to the payment to the government of any unpaid purchase money, includes a purchaser of Crown land and a pre-emptor of Crown land and any person entitled to the minerals or timber in or on or a lease to Crown land;

"registrar" means the registrar under the Land Title Act for the land title district in which the affected land is located.

Authority and power of gas utilities

(2) A gas utility to which a certificate of public convenience and necessity is granted after April 14, 1954 under the Utilities Commission Act or the legislation that preceded it is authorized and empowered, subject to the Utilities Commission Act, to carry on its business as a gas utility in the municipality or rural area mentioned in the certificate.

(3) Without limiting subsection (1) or (2), a gas utility authorized under either of those subsections may do one or all of the following:

(a) produce, generate, store, mix, transmit, distribute, deliver, furnish, sell and take delivery of gas;

(b) construct, develop, renew, alter, repair, maintain, operate and use property for any of those purposes;

(c) place, construct, renew, alter, repair, maintain, operate and use its pipes and other equipment and appliances for mixing, transmitting, distributing, delivering, furnishing and taking delivery of gas on, along, across, over or under any public street, lane, square, park, public place, bridge, viaduct, subway or watercourse

(i) in a municipality, on the conditions that the gas utility and the municipality agree to,

(ii) in a rural area that is neither treaty lands nor Nisg̱a'a Lands, on the conditions that the minister charged with the administration of the Transportation Act approves,

(iii) in treaty lands, as applicable under the final agreement,

(A) on the conditions the treaty first nation and gas utility agree to,

(B) on notice to the treaty first nation, or

(C) if, on receiving notice under clause (B), a work plan is required by the treaty first nation, as set out in a work plan approved by the treaty first nation, or

(iv) in Nisg̱a'a Lands, on the conditions that the gas utility and the Nisg̱a'a Nation or Nisg̱a'a Village, as applicable, agree to.

Matters under former Act

(2) A filing, return or report respecting a gas utility, made or deemed to have been made to the Energy Commission under the Energy Act, R.S.B.C. 1979, c. 108, before September 11, 1980, is deemed to have been made to the British Columbia Utilities Commission under this Act.

Contractual rights preserved

Definition

Right to expropriate land

Power to enter and use land in certain cases

(2) If the utility exercises its authority to enter and use the land, the utility must, within a reasonable time, expropriate or otherwise acquire the land required, and, in that event, the Expropriation Act applies.

Offence

Power to make regulations