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
Globalization is Fueling Global Warming
Globalization is Fueling Global Warming
by Les Leopold
AlterNet (December 28 2007)
As global warming negotiations move from Bali towards a worldwide
treaty, it is important to address how global warming and global trade
work hand-in-hand.
Globalization is to global warming what warm water in the Gulf of Mexico
waters was to Hurricane Katrina. And, unless we wisely limit rapidly
accelerating global trade, we will see equally disastrous and deadly
results - worsening global warming and a continued chemical poisoning of
our world.
Greenland Opens to Oil Firms
Greenland Opens to Oil Firms
Associated Press 01.14.08, 4:50 PM ET
HOUSTON -
Rising temperatures are giving Greenland the opportunity to tap into billions of barrels of oil and gas trapped under ice.
Stelmach Goes to Washington; Controversial Kearl Tar Sands Project Goes to Court
EcoJustice: Stelmach Goes to Washington; Controversial Kearl Tar Sands Project Goes to Court
Hard Times Sold in Vending Machines
Hard Times Sold in Vending Machines
Worker migration from Atlantic Canada to the tar sands
January 8, 2008
by Stuart Neatby
The Dominion - http://www.dominionpaper.ca
Big Oil's Profits and Plunder
by Ralph Nader, Nader.org
AlterNet (January 08 2008)
While many impoverished American families are shivering in the winter
cold for lack of money to pay the oil baron their exorbitant price for
home heating oil, ex-oil man, George W Bush sleeps in a warm White House
and relishes his defeat of the Congressional attempt to get rid of $15
billion in unconscionable tax breaks given those same profit-glutted oil
companies like ExxonMobil when crude oil was half the price it is today.
This is the same George W Bush who, calling himself a "compassionate
First Nations vow to occupy eastern Ont. site to block uranium mining
First Nations vow to occupy eastern Ont. site to block uranium mining
Keith Leslie, THE CANADIAN PRESS Published Friday January 11th, 2008
TORONTO - Aboriginals in eastern Ontario warned Friday that they would ignore a court order and illegally occupy the site of a proposed uranium mine north of Kingston later this month unless the province calls a halt to the project.
The Peak Oil Crisis: Storm of the Century
The Peak Oil Crisis: Storm of the Century
by Tom Whipple
Falls Church News Press (December 27 2007)
A "Perfect storm" refers to the simultaneous occurrence of events which,
taken individually, would be far less powerful than the result of their
chance combination. Such occurrences are rare by their very nature. --
Wikipedia
In recent weeks we have been bombarded with reports of perturbations in
the mortgage/liquidity crisis that is creating havoc in the financial world.
The travails of the "financial industry", as it is called these days,
Detroit: Say no to refinery expansion (for Albertan Tar Sands)
Detroit: Say no to refinery expansion
January 10, 2008
By ED McARDLE
In the debate over record gas prices, some experts point to dwindling supplies unable to meet soaring demand, while others stress lack of refinery capacity in the United States. Marathon Oil believes it has the answer.
High oil prices? You ain’t seen nothing yet
High oil prices? You ain’t seen nothing yet
Week of January 13, 2008 // Petroleum News
If you think $100 per barrel oil is costly, consider $180 per barrel oil.
The former is here, while the latter may be in our not-too-distant future, according to two well-known oil industry analysts.
While energy prices retreated during the second week of January amid continued signs of a slowing economy and forecasts for mild weather in the Northeast, crude oil prices are still hovering about 70 percent higher than year-ago levels.
S.Dakota: Keystone Pipeline Passes Regulatory Hurdle
Jan. 11, 2008, 12:08PM
S.D.: Pipeline Passes Regulatory Hurdle
By DIRK LAMMERS AP Business Writer
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. — A proposed oil pipeline that would deliver Canadian crude to U.S. refineries has passed another regulatory hurdle.
TransCanada Corp. said Friday that it has received a Final Environmental Impact Statement from the U.S. State Department that says its planned Keystone Pipeline project would result in limited adverse environmental impacts.
