Tarsands Infrastructure: South/East [US] is a category that represents the many connecting and supplying pipelines and associated projects that are needed to transport fuels for the production of tar sands bitumen and to move tar sand heavy bitumen to the Lower 48 of the US for refining. This involves some massive new pipeline projects to Illinois, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, Louisiana, California, Pennsylvania, Texas and elsewhere including existing refineries in Ontario and Quebec.
Though the category is labelled "US", the proposed new projects also traverse untouched Canadian territory across Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. The names of some of the larger ones include The Alberta Clipper Project, The Spearhead Pipeline (expansion) and the Keystone Pipeline, along with other pipelines controlled by TransCanada and Enbridge, as well as Imperial Oil. Despite the massive size and scale of pipeline networks already existing through the continental United States, these pipelines and associated construction would be needed to achieve US and Canadian government goals of reaching 5 million barrels a day of tar sand oil being shipped out of the tar sands "ground zero" of Alberta.
Tarsands are an addiction
By SILVER DONALD CAMERON
Sun. Mar 15 - 6:22 AM
THE ALBERTA tarsands, says Andrew Nikiforuk, represent "a nation-changing event" which has made the rest of Canada into "a suburb of Fort McMurray." A distinguished Calgary-based journalist, Nikiforuk was in Nova Scotia in early March to discuss his new book, Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the Future of a Continent (Greystone, $20).
TransCanada files plans for its second oil pipeline
By Bob Mercer
State Capitol Bureau
PIERRE -- TransCanada Keystone Pipeline company has applied to the state Public Utilities Commission for a permit to construct its second crude-oil pipeline through South Dakota, this time through the sparsely populated ranch country west of the Missouri River.
The Calgary-based company’s construction timetable calls for work to begin in South Dakota in 2011 and service to begin in 2012, with a peak construction work force of up to 1,400 people during the months of May through August of 2011.
TransCanada has eyes on California as possible future market
CALGARY - TransCanada Corp. (TSX:TRP) sees California as a potential future market for Canadian crude oil, an executive with the Calgary-based pipeline giant said Tuesday.
The company has a long-term proposal to ship crude from Northern Alberta's oilsands region down to energy-hungry California, said Steve Becker, TransCanada's vice-president of pipeline development.
The unspoken part of this "unpalatable" duality is that green-minded folks have just such an equally repulsive "choice". Either be "unreasonable" and "not a part of the solution" by pointing out that CCS and all other Climate Change in the tar sands "solutions" are nonsense, especially when one sees the forms of emissions yet to come from the In Situ developments. There is no solving the climate crisis, preventing deforestation, preserving the Mackenzie River Basin or using the remaining natural gas on Turtle Island in a sane manner-- unless we also prevent the tar sands from operating.
Pipeline could bring needed revenue to state
By Aaron Nelson
Black Hills Pioneer
BELLE FOURCHE - A crude oil pipeline that would become the longest in North America and could bring much needed revenue and as many as 2,000 workers to the western region of the state would pass through Butte County, officials told county commissioners on Wednesday.
*Ottawa, Canada, February 19, 2009 –* United States President Barack Obama
is meeting today with Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada for his first
foreign visit as a President. The main discussion will center on trade
between the two nations as well as topics of environment, climate and energy
security in North America. Obama's concerns about implementing an agenda for
a clean and green energy economy highlights' Canada's oil sands, a vast
potential oil source that comes at a big cost to the environment and the
Work on Keystone pipeline scheduled to begin mid-May
Associated Press • February 16, 2009
YANKTON – Work on the TransCanada Keystone oil pipeline in southeast South Dakota is expected to begin in mid-May with several hundred workers using Yankton as construction headquarters for much of the year.
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Spokesman Jeff Rauh says they’ll start in Hutchinson County and work their way south about 130 miles into Nebraska.
The initial work will be locating and marking buried utilities. Other crews will remove topsoil, bury and weld the pipe, and inspect it.
TransCanada told to continue expansion
Oil companies want pipeline built on schedule
Carrie Tait, Financial Post
February 04, 2009
TransCanada Corp., after suggesting in October that it would be willing to delay construction on a pipeline expansion project if its shippers so desired because of the tanking credit and energy markets, immediately took a little heat from its customers.
Pipeline developer seeks waiver for transport to Gulf
Associated Press - January 26, 2009 5:25 PM ET
HELENA, Mont. (AP) - Developers of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline to move Canadian crude oil to Gulf Coast refineries want an increase in the limit on pressure within the line.
The developers say the higher limit would optimize the flow of oil.
TransCanada Keystone Pipeline of Calgary, Alberta, wants to draw on up to 80% of the pipeline wall's strength -- rather than the maximum 72% specified in federal regulations.
This past summer, myself and friends were able to "tour" many of the projects in the Athabasca mining region and south of Fort McMurray (one of many places) where SagD/In Situ operations rule the day. These are albums belatedly created from that trip. This does not comprise anything remotely coming towards an exhaustive set of the multiple projects.
(you do not need to have a Facebook identity to see these albums).
Photos are from the land and the air.
Opti-Nexen's Long Lake (North) Project & CP's Surmont Project.
