Taseko River

The Taseko River (pronEng|təˈsiːkoʊ) is a tributary of British Columbia's Chilko River, a tributary of the Chilcotin River which joins the Fraser near the city of Williams Lake.

The Taseko has its origins at Taylor Pass in the heart of an alpine area known as the South Chilcotin. Taylor Pass connects with Slim Creek, a major tributary of Gun Creek, which feeds the Bridge River via the Carpenter Lake reservoir. Major tributaries of the Taseko include the Lord River, which joins the Taseko via Upper Taseko Lake, which the Taseko enters from its own source, and the Tchaikazan River which flows directly into Lower Taseko Lake. At the outlet of the two Taseko Lakes the river issues onto the broad Chilcotin Plateau. From source to Upper Taseko Lake, the Taseko is about 30 kilometres in length. From Lower Taseko Lake to the Taseko's confluence with the Chilko River is about 85 kilometres. Including the 25 kilometre length of both Taseko Lakes, the total length of the Taseko River is around 140 kilometres.

A proposed but temporarily shelved hydroelectric proposal would dam and divert the Taseko Lakes and divert the Taseko's flow into Chilko Lake, from where another diversion would take the combined flow of the Chilko and Taseko Rivers and feed it into the coastal drainage of the Homathko River at Tatlayoko Lake, which would also be dammed. Further dams in the Homathko River's Great Canyon are part of the proposal, which would flood key historic sites related to the Chilcotin War of 1864.