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.
Nuclear power talks continue in the county
Despite questions from Woodlands County council the province has declined to get involved in the nuclear power discussion.
Chandra Lye
Star Staff
Wednesday October 31, 2007
A letter received from Sustainable Resource Development (SRD) Minister Ted Morton told council that the department would not consider a land purchase application, submitted this summer, because of Energy Alberta’s decision to build a nuclear plant in Peace River.
Oil sands seen as 'threat No. 1,' as U.S. may target dirtier fuels
SHAWN MCCARTHY
GLOBAL ENERGY REPORTER
October 30, 2007
Canadian oil sands producers should brace for further bad news - this time from south of the border, as the U.S. government moves toward a national climate change policy that could target dirtier fossil fuels such as the oil sands bitumen, a former U.S. energy official said yesterday.
Oil and its peaks
Peter Foster, Financial Post
Published: Friday, November 02, 2007
About 25 years ago (my God, I'm old!) I was having dinner in New York with a stockbroker friend who was telling me that oil was headed for US$100 a barrel. I said that I didn't think it would ever see US$40 again in real terms. As of yesterday, I'm still right (and my friend is still rich, which proves that it's better to be a stockbroker than smart, although both is preferable).
Energy Alberta Corporation's full application to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission dated Aug 25, 2007 can be downloaded as a pdf from this link:
http://www.energyab.com/pdf/CNSC%20-%20Application%20for%20a%20licence%2...
Additional pro-nuclear propaganda by Energy Alberta Corporation, the Canadian Nuclear Association, and others is contained on this page:
TransCanada evaluating nuclear for Alberta
01 November 2007
TransCanada, Canada's largest pipeline company, is the latest to consider the use of nuclear energy in order to meet Alberta's increasing energy requirements.
"We think Alberta is in an interesting situation just because the long-term supply/demand fundamentals are good in Alberta, there is certainly demand for power," TransCanada's CEO Hal Kvisle said during a conference call to discuss the company's results for the third quarter of 2007.
Beyond the Age of Petroleum
by MICHAEL T. KLARE
The Nation [from the November 12, 2007 issue]
INAC “no” to UR-Energy uranium drilling in the Thelon
By LEA STORRY, SRJ Editor 31.OCT.07
The beauty of the NWT’s Upper Thelon is safe...for now. Chuck Strahl, the minister of Indian and northern affairs Canada (INAC), formally accepted the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board (Review Board) recommendation that exploration work proposed by UR-Energy be rejected without an environmental impact review.
Quote:
“I think we look forward a little more optimistically because I don’t think anyone would be more aware than us of the challenges of sustaining gas production in Alberta,” he said.
It is arrogant when I see this, and mentally put it along side what MGP proponents in their office in Inuvik explained about the gas going to fuel the tar sands: "It is not up to our control as producers to determine who buys it on a free market".
Mud, sweat and tears
The vast tar sands of Alberta in Canada hold oil reserves six times the size of Saudi Arabia's. But this 'black gold' is proving a mixed blessing for the frontier town of Fort McMurray, fuelling both prosperity and misery. As the social and environmental toll mounts, Aida Edemariam reports on the dark side of a boom town.
Aida Edemariam
The Guardian// UK
Tuesday October 30 2007
October 28, 2007
Anthem (click on the image)
by Katie Beaton
The Dominion - http://www.dominionpaper.ca
anthem.jpg
