Alberta Tar Sands is a category limited to the location and production of tar sand bitumen, an area the size of the state of Florida in northern Alberta province. The giant processing plants near Fort McMurray where the land itself is strip mined as well as the primarily "in situ" in-ground steam separation/production and extraction plants in the Peace and Cold Lake Regions, all in Alberta, are the "Ground Zero" of the single largest industrial gigaproject ever proposed in human history.
The process of removing the tar from the sand involves incredible amounts of energy from clean-burning natural gas (with nuclear proposed along side), tremendous capital costs during build up, incredibly high petroleum prices to protect investments, and the largest single industrial contribution to climate change in North America. Production also involves the waste of fresh water from nearby lakes, rivers and aquifers that have already created toxic tailing ponds visible from outer space. None of the land strip mined has yet to be certified as reclaimed. It takes 4 tonnes of soil to produce one barrel of oil. The tar sands are producing over 1.2 million barrels of oil a day on average. The oil companies, Canada and the United States governments are proposing to escalate production to 5 million barrels, almost all destined for American markets-- and lower environmental standards while doing so. They also would need to violate the national and human rights of many indigenous nations who are rightly concerned about many dire social, environmental and economic repercussions on their communities.
To get the needed energy supplies, diluent for the bitumen and diverted freshwater to produce and then to transport the flowing heavy bitumen for refining would require massive new infrastructure and pipeline building from three different time zones in the Arctic, across British Columbia and through Alberta in a criss-cross pattern, into pipelines to such destinations as California, China, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Ontario, Illinois, Wisconsin and Texas. This entire project is now estimated at over $170 billion dollars. And after the whole process described so far, only then will all this dirty petroleum get burned and expel greenhouse gasses into the air causing further climate change.
Environmentalists Win landmark Tar Sands Lawsuit
Court Finds Gaping Holes in Environmental Assessment
EDMUNTON - March 5 -The Federal Court of Canada today released a judgment finding fatal legal errors in the environmental assessment of the Kearl Tar Sands Project, north of Fort McMurray.
Ecojustice lawyer Sean Nixon was in court in January on behalf of the Pembina Institute, Sierra Club of Canada, the Toxics Watch Society of Alberta and the Prairie Acid Rain Coalition.
Are the Sacred Headwaters being sacrificed for the Tar Sands?
The Athabasca Oil Sands are the largest single source of greenhouse
gases in Canada. They are also one of the largest users of methane, also
known as natural gas.
Bitumen extraction is an energy intensive process that requires between
700 and 1200 cubic feet of natural gas to produce one barrel of bitumen.
The natural gas is used to heat water, which is mixed with tar sands to
separate the crude bitumen (a semi-solid form of crude oil), from
silica, clay and other minerals.
Sherritt International [in partnership with the Ontario Teachers Pension
Plan and Epcor] is proposing to develop a large $1.5B coal gasification
project 3/4 of an hour south east of Edmonton. The primary purpose of this
project will be to produce syngas and/or hydrogen which then can be sold to
bitumen upgraders, refineries and the heavy oil industry. Sherritt hopes to
cash in on further tar sands expansion.
The area of the project is approximately 312 sq kms [most of which is
productive agricultural land] and will be bordered by the town of Tofield,
Note: Fort Chip is not a reserve, but a hamlet.
--M
Reserve holds cancer rally
By SHANNON MONTGOMERY The Canadian Press
Sun. Mar 2 - 4:46 AM
EDMONTON — Janelle Vermillion owns a house in the tiny northern Alberta community of Fort Chipewyan. Her family, including her brother, still lives there. She considers it home.
But the 27-year-old woman says she will never again feel safe living there.
"I just want to move back home," she said, fighting back tears as she gestured to the pink-clad six-month-old baby in the stroller in front of her.
"The reality is that the best oilsands rights have already been secured, promises to investors have been made, plans have been drafted, money is being spent and the areas proposed for the time out have marginal potential."
Therefore, the need to shut down the tar sands and *cancel* the existing leases....no more industry-friendly greenwash courtesy of Pew/Sunoco and other multi-billion dollar US foundations.
- Tarpit Pete
Oilsands lease issue tempest in a teapot
It's hardly a call to slow development in the Athabasca region
Claudia Cattaneo, Financial Post
Nothing new here really, as the multi-billion dollar US foundations along with the corporate environmentalists on their payrolls have been playing the low-hanging fruit greenwash strategy for decades, most recently in the Great Bear Rainforest deal and in the Mackenzie Valley. But in the mainstream media it takes the hard-nosed "Report on Business" to understand what's really going on, as the soft liberal left buys right into the greenwash game.
- Tarpit Pete
Why Big Oil discovered its love of trees
DEREK DeCLOET
Finally Canada's establishment newspaper gets it right! The proposed partial moratorium is indeed a PR greenwash smokescreen:
Proportionality
by Richard Heinberg
Energy Bulletin (February 07 2008)
There is a strange clause in the North American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA) that applies to only one country - Canada. The clause states
that Canada must continue to supply the same proportion of its oil and
gas resources to the US in future years as it does now. That's rather a
good deal for the US: it formalizes Canada's status as a resource
satellite of its imperial hub to the south.
From a Canadian perspective there are some problems with the
Oil patch split over proposal for partial moratorium
NORVAL SCOTT
February 25, 2008
CALGARY -- A business-led lobbying effort to create a partial moratorium on oil sands development in order to free up conservation land has divided Canada's major energy companies, while a government decision on the issue will likely be delayed until after next Monday's provincial election.
Major oil producers - led by Petro-Canada Corp., Suncor Inc., Husky Energy Ltd., Shell Canada and Imperial Oil - have for the first time called on Alberta to slow development in the Athabasca region.
Clip:
"Are we going to see [U.S.] troops on our soil for minor potential threats
to a pipeline or a road?" he asked.
Good question, but what's our collective answer?
--M
Vancouver Sun February 23, 2008
Canada-U.S. pact allows cross-border military activity
Deal allows either country to send troops across the other's border to deal
with an emergency
David Pugliese
Canada and the U.S. have signed an agreement that paves the way for the
militaries from either nation to send troops across each other's borders
