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
Ottawa Citizen Op Ed on Tar Sands
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.
Prestigious Scientific Journal "Nature" Slams Conservative Anti-Science Politics on Climate Change and the Tarpits
Nature
Nature 451, 866 (21 February 2008) | doi:10.1038/451866a; Published online 20 February 2008
Science in retreat
Canada has been scientifically healthy.
Not so its government.
Comparisons of nations’ scientific outputs over the years have
shown that Canada’s researchers have plenty to be proud of,
consistently maintaining their country’s position among the
world’s top ten (see, for example, Nature 430, 311–316; 2004). Alas,
their government’s track record is dismal by comparison.
When the Canadian government announced earlier this year that it
Feds Expand TFW Programs
Ottawa expands work program
2 new offices to help ease labour needs
Feb 12, 2008 04:30 AM
Nicholas Keung
IMMIGRATION/DIVERSITY REPORTER
Ottawa is expanding the temporary foreign worker program into Ontario to help fill the province's labour needs, a move some fear could further hurt already underutilized and underpaid skilled immigrants.
Immigration Minister Diane Finley announced yesterday the opening of the program's two new offices in Toronto and Moncton, N.B., in addition to the three already established in Vancouver, Calgary and Montreal.
Excerpt from Alberta Liberals / Kevin Taft on "Labour Shortages"
Excerpt from Alberta Liberals / Kevin Taft on "Labour Shortages"
Oil Price Closed Above $100 a Barrel; World Leaders Ignore this Signal of Impending Shortages
Oil Price Closed Above $100 a Barrel; World Leaders Ignore this Signal of Impending Shortages
Press release, The Oil Drum
The price for West Texas Intermediate (WTI) oil closed above $100 for the first time on February 19, 2008. "Rising oil prices have been giving a clear signal of pending shortages for over five years now," according to TheOilDrum.com. By ignoring this signal, world leaders are steering the world toward an energy disaster characterized by shortages, high energy prices, inflation, civil unrest and famine.
Utah: Meetings set in 3 cities on oil shale, tar sands
Meetings set in 3 cities on oil shale, tar sands
Feb. 16, 2008 12:09 a.m. MST
Public meetings have been scheduled in three Utah cities to discuss development of the state's oil shale and tar sands resources. The shale and sands resources fall within the jurisdictions of the Moab, Monticello, Price, Richfield and Vernal BLM field offices.
The Bureau of Land Management has set up the following informal meetings:
Big oil's enemy within
Big oil's enemy within
The ultimate threat to big oil comes not from green campaigners - but its own shareholders
February 20, 2008 12:15 AM
Tony Hayward
New BP boss Tony Hayward has overseen a reversal of policy towards tar sands.
Business leaders are now pleading with governments for regulation. When did that last happen? Executives usually hate anything that interferes with their freedom of movement. But climate change appears to have changed all that.
Dehcho "Unlikely to Buckle" under new Chief over MGP
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.
Fort Chip Residents Confront Stelmach on Tar Sands Poisoning of their People
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.
