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
"And Then Let's Go for that Justice" Part I
"And Then Let's Go for that Justice" Part I
The Walk4Justice
by Maya Rolbin-Ghanie
The Dominion - http://www.dominionpaper.ca
Some of the many Indigenous women and men who walked across Canada to draw attention to systemic abuses against First Nations women. Photo: Maya Rolbin-Ghanie
This article is part one of two on the Walk4Justice.
Peace-Athabasca Delta gets special international designation
Alta. delta gets special international designation
by Margaret Munro, Canwest News Service
February 3, 2009
The Peace-Athabasca Delta in northern Alberta was declared one of the Western Hemisphere's most extraordinary and endangered places Tuesday by a leading environmental group that named the delta a "BioGem" it will campaign to save.
New rules govern cleanup of tailings ponds
New rules govern cleanup of tailings ponds
KATHERINE O'NEILL
February 4, 2009
EDMONTON -- A controversial byproduct of oil-sands operations at the centre of an environmental scandal last spring involving 500 dead ducks will be subjected to tougher rules by Alberta's energy regulator.
Tailings ponds - the toxic, watery waste left over from bitumen processing - must be cleaned up and better managed under new targets and timelines for oil-sands producers.
From Industry: "North American large-diameter pipe orders under pressure"
North American large-diameter pipe orders under pressure
Date: 28/01/2009
With significant declines in the commodities and energy complex, North American large diameter pipe-makers will experience a slowdown. K C Chang reports.
Going into the first half of 2009, IHS Global Insight does not expect a rebound in new pipe orders until oil and natural gas prices gain traction and credit markets improve.
market dims hope for Alaska gas pipeline
Analyst: market dims hope for Alaska gas pipeline
(Published January 24, 2009)
ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Energy market analysts addressed an Anchorage audience hoping for a multibillion dollar Alaska natural gas pipeline and the news was not good.
The global economic crisis has slashed demand for natural gas and dimmed chances for an Alaska pipeline, they said. The line also faces expanded competition.
"It's certainly going to be taken off the urgent list," said Ed Kelly, a Houston-based vice president with the global energy consulting firm Wood Mackenzie.
Keysone XL Pipeline developer seeks waiver for transport to Gulf
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.
The Integrity of Creation and the Athabasca Tar Sands
2009 January 25 - The Integrity of Creation and the Athabasca Oil Sands
A Pastoral Letter on The Integrity of Creation and the Athabasca Oil Sands to The Faithful of the diocese of St. Paul on The Occasion of the Jubilee Year in Honour of St. Paul by
†Luc Bouchard Bishop of St. Paul in Alberta, Canada
January 25th, 2009
The Integrity of Creation and the Athabasca Oil Sands
“Faced with the widespread destruction of the environment people
everywhere are coming to understand that we cannot continue to
use the goods of the earth as we have in the past. . . a new ecological
Environmental Group Wants Enquiry into Enbridge Gateway Proposal
Environmental Group Wants Enquiry into Enbridge Gateway Proposal
Sun, 2009-01-18
The Friends of the Wild Salmon Coalition is calling for a full public inquiry into Enbridge's proposed Northern Gateway Project. The project, if approved would consist of two pipelines - one to transport tar-sands oil from Edmonton to Kitimat, and the other would transport condensate from Kitimat, back to Alberta. Friends of the Wild Salmon Coordinator Pat Moss says they are concerned about the location of the pipelines.
Greenwashing the Games: The Olympics will leave a gigantic footprint
Greenwashing the Games: The Olympics will leave a gigantic footprint on
the city
By John Nevim
Photo by Janis Brass
More than two-and-a-half years have passed since the “Battle of the
Bluffs”, when 23 protesters were arrested by West Vancouver police for
blockading the expansion of the Sea-to-Sky highway through the Eagleridge
Bluffs.
The protest was especially notable for the jailing of two elderly
protesters, Betty Krawczyk and Harriet Nahanee, who refused to apologize
because they believed it was senseless environmental degradation for the
"Canada delusional about tar sands, oil"
Canada delusional about oil
Jan 26, 2009 04:30 AM
David Crane
There is this Canadian delusion that the Alberta oil sands will give
us special influence with the new Obama administration, that energy is
our trump card in the Canada-U.S. relationship because, it's argued,
the United States desperately needs our oil. It fosters the false
belief that we can get concessions from the U.S. in other areas by
producing more oil.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper has talked of Canada as an "energy
superpower"; Environment Minister Jim Prentice talks of Canada's
