Tar Sands 101
The Tar Sands "Gigaproject" is the largest industrial project in human history and likely also the most destructive. The tar sands mining procedure releases at least three times the CO2 emissions as regular oil production and is slated to become the single largest industrial contributor in North America to Climate Change.
The tar sands are already slated to be the cause of up to the second fastest rate of deforestation on the planet behind the Amazon Rainforest Basin. Currently approved projects will see 3 million barrels of tar sands mock crude produced daily by 2018; for each barrel of oil up to as high as five barrels of water are used.
Human health in many communities has seriously taken a turn for the worse with many causes alleged to be from tar sands production. Tar sands production has led to many serious social issues throughout Alberta, from housing crises to the vast expansion of temporary foreign worker programs that racialize and exploit so-called non-citizens. Infrastructure from pipelines to refineries to super tanker oil traffic on the seas crosses the continent in all directions to allthree major oceans and the Gulf of Mexico.
The mock oil produced primarily is consumed in the United States and helps to subsidize continued wars of aggression against other oil producing nations such as Iraq, Venezuela and Iran.
To understand the tar sands in more depth, continue to our Tar Sands 101 reading list
Global warming 'underestimated'
Global warming 'underestimated'
Sunday, 15 February 2009
BBC News
Prof Field said the IPCC was running behind forecasts
The severity of global warming over the next century will be much worse
than previously believed, a leading climate scientist has warned.
Professor Chris Field, an author of a 2007 landmark report on climate
change, said future temperatures "will be beyond anything" predicted.
Prof Field said the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
report had underestimated the rate of change.
The Role of the Environmentalist: A Bias for Life
The Role of the Environmentalist
A Bias for Life
Weekend Edition
August 30 / 31, 2008
By JOSH SCHLOSSBERG
After decades of speaking on Nature's behalf, the environmental movement continues to gain power and influence in the U.S. With media, government and even big business preaching the green gospel all of a sudden, modern day enviros might finally have an opportunity to start reversing the course of Earth-death, rather than just "slowing down the rate at which things have been getting worse."
Tanker Threat to B.C. Coast and Waterways
Tanker Threat to B.C. Coast and Waterways
Written by Ingmar Lee
Thursday,
12 February 2009
A letter from Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline (Feb. 7) suggests that supertankers carrying crude oil through the Douglas Channel would be business as usual.
To the editor of the Victoria Times-Colonist
Re: "Tankers won't be travelling Inside Passage route," letter,
Feb. 7.
"Mackenzie pipeline project faces further setback"
Mackenzie pipeline project faces further setback
By Bruce Nichols, Reuters
February 11, 2009
HOUSTON - Regulatory delays have worsened the odds that the $16.2 billion Mackenzie gas pipeline in Canada's far north will ever be built despite a promise of help from Ottawa, TransCanada Corp's chief executive said Wednesday.
TransCanada CEO Hal Kvisle said he is frustrated that the pipeline, which would carry gas to Canadian and U.S. markets from the Mackenzie Delta on the Beaufort Sea, still does not have clearance to go ahead after years of planning and rising costs.
"TransCanada CEO downbeat about Mackenzie Gas Project"
TransCanada CEO downbeat about Mackenzie line
Wed Feb 11, 2009 8:48pm GMT
By Bruce Nichols
HOUSTON, Feb 11 (Reuters) - Regulatory delays have worsened the odds that the C$16.2 billion ($13 billion) Mackenzie gas pipeline in Canada's far north will ever be built despite a promise of help from Ottawa, TransCanada Corp's (TRP.TO) chief executive said on Wednesday.
Temporary foreign workers first to suffer layoffs
Temporary foreign workers first to suffer layoffs
Updated Sun. Feb. 8 2009 11:02 AM ET
The Canadian Press
CTV.ca
CALGARY -- Since the economy began unravelling last fall, Thomas has
been getting fewer shifts at the manufacturing company where he works.
The plant was shut down all of last week, and now Thomas and some of his
co-workers are worried they may soon have no job at all.
"We used to send money back home to our families and now we don't even
have money to support ourselves here," he said in Spanish through a
translator.
Israel Presses for Oil From Shale (from 2006)
Israel Presses for Oil From Shale
With the help of homegrown technology, an Israeli company's proposed energy plant could help the country vastly reduce oil imports
JULY 5, 2006
Human trafficking set to increase for 2010 Games
Human trafficking set to increase for 2010 Games
Tue Feb. 10 2009
ctvbc.ca
One year from now, people from around the world will gather in Vancouver for the 2010 Winter Olympics.
But as the final plans for Thursday's countdown celebrations are
ironed out -- some fear Vancouver will be welcoming more than just
athletes and fans. There is a concern that human trafficking is set to
increase. And one group is taking action.
Major Brian Venables of the Salvation Army opens the door to room 712 of its latest safe house.
RCMP tap local activists (2010 Games)
RCMP tap local activists
posted by Jason Youmans
02/11/2009 8:00 AM
It appears the RCMP dragnet to quash 2010 Olympic opposition before it
begins has washed up on the shores of Vancouver Island.
One local business owner says he was approached two weeks ago at the
end of his work day by a man who identified himself as RCMP agent Mike
Smook and who then asked to step inside for a word.
Smook told Dark Horse Books owner Robert Garfat that he was working on
behalf of the RCMP General Investigation Services, although it has
Q&A: Energy Independence, Obama and Canada’s Tar Sands
February 9, 2009
Q&A: Energy Independence, Obama and Canada’s Oil Sands
By John Lorinc
“There are two perspectives on the oil sands,” the author Andrew
Nikiforuk says. “You have companies that want to make it the next
Saudi Arabia. The other is that it’s a transitional resource to a low-
carbon economy.”
Andrew Nikiforuk, a journalist based in Calgary, has closely followed
the development of northern Alberta’s massive deposits of bitumen — a
heavy black oil impregnating the sand and soil over hundreds of square
miles northeast of Edmonton.
