Oil Sands Truth: Shut Down the Tar Sands

International oil & gas

Stock markets and global oil interests (including war) would be included here, as would attempts to get oil out of high risk, low return areas from oil shale in Colorado, to natural gas and heavy oil in the high eastern Arctic. The tar sands are part of this trend and should be seen as such. What happens with the tar sands will have a tremendous impact on what kind of choices are made elsewhere, environmentally and socially.

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International Oil & Gas is a category for stories relating to tar sand production or climate change but not in any of the projects already listed geographically. This includes other regions of the planet with horrible environmental and high energy costs that, like the tar sands, are only a "choice" because of high prices and the global depletion of easily recoverable oil reserves. Such issues as the threat of war on Iran, "instability" in Iraq and Venezuela or disasters like Katrina will all drive up oil prices, which in turn doubly encourages tar sand production-- by price demand and energy demand. Stock markets and global oil interests (including war) would be included here, as would attempts to get oil out of high risk, low return areas from oil shale in Colorado, to natural gas and heavy oil in the high eastern Arctic. The tar sands are part of this trend and should be seen as such. What happens with the tar sands will have a tremendous impact on what kind of choices are made elsewhere, environmentally and socially.

Pasta, Beer, Easter Eggs too Expensive because of Ethanol

Meat, dairy and other food producers assail ethanol
Congress about to decide whether to require sixfold hike in fuel output
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 09.16.2007

WASHINGTON — Already this year, ethanol has been blamed for more expensive Easter eggs, dying shrimp along the Louisiana coastline and costlier milk in school lunches.

Germans curse biofuels for higher beer costs. In Italy, consumer advocates organized a pasta boycott last week, complaining that pasta prices have soared because farmers grow crops for fuel, not food.

Peak Pasta in Italy: Biofuel increases price of Wheat

Wheat Prices Send Italian Pasta Costs Up

By COLLEEN BARRY
The Associated Press
Thursday, September 13, 2007; 8:40 PM

MILAN, Italy -- Consumer groups urged Italians to refrain from buying pasta Thursday to protest rising prices for the beloved Italian staple, in a strike that was high on symbolic value but apparently low on real impact.

CNN gets in on the Peak: "The End of Oil"

The article here, rather poorly put together, nonetheless should be noted for a multitude of reasons & not least that this is on CNN and is a follow up on the GAO in the lower 48 actually discussing the problem. There is a slow but clear trend towards not just peak oil, but peak denial. We have hit the peak in reasonable denial; the costs of continuing any further such denial are simply too great for the "market of ideas" to bear.

--M

The end of oil
A small - but growing - group of experts think world oil production will peak in the next few years, to devastating effect.

Shell Claiming "Psychology" Driving Oil Prices; Aim to ramp up Tar Sands Production 5 times

Shell Chief Says `Psychology' Boosting Oil Prices

By Sonja Franklin

Sept. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Royal Dutch Shell Plc Chief Executive Officer Jeroen van der Veer said there is sufficient crude oil supply in global markets and that prices are driven by speculation.

``The supply and demand is pretty OK,'' he said at a briefing with reporters in Calgary today. ``What we do have is a lot of psychology in the price. We have to expect volatility in the oil price due to this psychological component.''

Peak Oil Facts Converge with Theory

Copyright 2007 Financial Times Information
Global News Wire - Asia Africa Intelligence Wire
Copyright 2007 Kasturi & Sons Ltd,
The Financial Times Limited
September 14, 2007 Friday
PEAK OIL FACTS CONVERGE WITH THEORY

Canada votes 'no' as UN native rights declaration passes

Canada votes 'no' as UN native rights declaration passes
Last Updated: Thursday, September 13, 2007 | 3:07 PM CT
CBC News

The international community adopted the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples on Thursday, despite high-profile opposition from Canada and three other countries.

Tahltan Protest against Shell/CBM takes campaign to British media

Protest against Shell takes campaign to British media
CATHRYN ATKINSON
September 11, 2007
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20070911.BCSHELL11/TPSt...

Native protesters and environmental groups are taking the next round of their fight against a coal-bed methane exploration project in a remote part of central B.C. to the British media.

Hugo Knows the Value of His Tar

Exxon Mobil Seeks Arbitration Over Venezuela Assets (Update4)

By Jim Kennett and Steven Bodzin

Sept. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest oil company, filed for arbitration in a dispute over assets seized by the Venezuelan government.

The Irving, Texas-based company's 41.7 percent stake in the heavy oil project had a net-book value of about $750 million at the time of the expropriation, according to a regulatory filing today. The company said it requested arbitration Sept. 6 with the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes.

Suncor Trying to Buy Up Natural Gas Supplies for Tar Pits

However benignly this article is written, it means that the pipeline infrastructure from all directions-- BC, NWT, southern AB, lower 48 and more-- is expected to grow heading *into* the tar pits so that it can grow heading *out of* the tar pits. This doesn't include the "into" pipelines for 'diluent' kerosene needed to convert heavy bitumen into a flowing sludge mock-oil. This article is timed with the corporate projection announcement made by Suncor that they intend to overtake Syncrude as the single largest producer of tar sands mock oil this year. Small wonder, it's a matter of physics.

Canada's water 'on the negotiating table'

Canada's water 'on the negotiating table,' report says
Vague wording in NAFTA doesn't protect country against bulk shipments and other forms of sale to the U.S.
MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20070910.WATER10/TPStor...
September 10, 2007

Despite regular assurances from the federal government that Canada won't allow water exports, the country remains vulnerable to water diversions to an increasingly thirsty United States, says a new research paper commissioned by the Munk Centre for International Studies at the University of Toronto.