Indigenous nations have protected the earth on their territories for thousands of years. With the government of Canada ignoring their sovereignty, nations not only see massive theft of resources that could help alleviate social problems, but their exacerbation through their further alienation from their own lands, often accompanying being overrun by development and southern workers, while having no self-determination during this process. In the south of Canada industrial farming displaced many nations with often genocidal results. In the north, a modern equivalent of that fate is only just beginning, wrought on by industrial oil and gas drilling schemes (among many industrial plans) that are condemning entire societies, languages and cultures to a precarious future, becoming minorities in their lands for the first time.
Sun, February 24, 2008
Clipper pipeline project approved
But Canadian regulator attaches conditions
By LAUREN KRUGEL, CP
CALGARY -- The National Energy Board has approved the $2-billion Alberta Clipper oil pipeline proposed by Enbridge Inc. but attached certain conditions in response to concerns raised in public hearings last November.
The 1,600-km pipeline will stretch from Alberta to Wisconsin and will have an initial capacity of 450,000 barrels of oil a day.
Fri, February 22, 2008
Gateway pipeline back on track
UPDATED: 2008-02-22 01:25:47 MST
Enbridge will transport product from Alberta oilsands to B.C. coast
By MARKUS ERMISCH, SUN MEDIA
Pipeline company Enbridge Inc. has picked up construction pace on the Gateway Pipeline after slowing down the project in late 2006.
Construction is expected to finish between 2012 and 2014, said company spokeswoman Jennifer Varey, noting that construction costs will most likely come in above the original $4 billion.
Cost pressures primarily stem from higher labour prices and materials costs.
Enbridge rekindles oilsands pipeline plan
Jeffrey Jones, Reuters Published: Thursday, February 21, 2008
CALGARY -- Enbridge Inc. has rekindled plans for a $4-billion pipeline to Canada's West Coast in response to demand from producers and refiners wanting oilsands-derived crude shipped to Asia, Enbridge's chief executive said Thursday.
Enbridge, the country's second-largest pipeline operator, has convinced enough potential customers to fund the remaining costs to get the Gateway pipeline project to the regulatory approval stage, CEO Pat Daniel said.
Matt Price and Allan Adam
Citizen Special
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Todd Korol, Reuters
Canadians are becoming familiar with the scale of destruction in the
tarsands, something that First Nations of the region have known for some
time now.
And people around the world are learning why our country has taken such an
obstructionist role on global warming. Canada and the Bush administration
stand alone against the rest of the world because with the tarsands we are
housing the single most destructive project anywhere on Earth, and the
Americans are getting the oil.
Pipeline holdouts unlikely to buckle
By CP
FORT SIMPSON, N.W.T. -- The new leader of the last aboriginal group to hold out against a northern natural gas pipeline says he isn't likely to bring the Dehcho First Nation on board the $16-billion project any time soon.
Gerald Antoine, chosen last week as interim chief, said yesterday he's not convinced joining a consortium of northern aboriginals that would own a one-third share in the Mackenzie Valley project would serve his people's best interests.
Stelmach denies governments ignoring oilsands health woes
PC leader listens to concerns from native spokesman
Darcy Henton, with files from Mike De Souza, Canwest News Service, Edmonton Journal
Published: Saturday, February 16, 2008
Just after Tory Leader Ed Stelmach derided a new report that calls Alberta's oilsands "the most destructive development on earth," he was confronted by a Mikisew Cree who's worried the megaprojects are poisoning his people.
Algonquin leader fined, jailed six months; Second uranium mining protester also fined but released on 'compassionate grounds'
Posted By Sue Yanagisawa Whig-Standard Court Reporter
Feb 16/08
The lawyer for a uranium prospecting company, frustrated by an Algonquin-led protest that disrupted the company's plans for test drilling north of Sharbot Lake last summer, said it gave him "no pleasure to ask for incarceration."
Environmentalists' report to call for Ottawa to act on tar sands
BILL CURRY
From Friday's Globe and Mail
February 15, 2008
OTTAWA - Alberta's oil sands are the most destructive project on Earth,
causing environmental damage well beyond provincial borders, a new report
says.
>From acid rain falling in Saskatchewan to toxic pollution spewing from
Ontario oil refineries, a report to be released this morning by
Toronto-based Environmental Defence calls on Ottawa to act where Alberta
will not.
The environmentalists will be joined by two Alberta native leaders, who will
Former chief won't give up uranium mine battle
Posted By Sue Yanagisawa
A former chief of the Ardoch Algonquin First Nations yesterday told Justice Douglas Cunningham that he will continue to resist uranium prospecting on lands claimed by Frontenac Ventures Corp. north of Sharbot Lake, even if it means disobeying an order of the court.
