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
Tar Sands are Running out of Pipelines
As labour shortages are going to take a short while to be dealt with through the importation of "guest workers" on top of already getting Newfoundlanders to fly in weekly while energy throughout the province is already stretched to beyond capacity, the pipeline problem is the third de facto part of an existing physics-based moratorium. With all of these shortages and the US Dep't of Energy screaming for quadrupling tar sands bitumen production, our strategy to block new pipeline construction at the least slows down the entire project.
--M
Oilsands face pipeline space shortage
Tarsands workers rally in Fort McMurray
Oilsands workers rally in Fort McMurray
Protesting ongoing labour dispute
http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Alberta/2007/08/23/4441128.html
By CP
FORT MCMURRAY — Hundreds of workers fed up with an ongoing labour dispute in the oilsands rallied in Fort McMurray on Wednesday night.
The workers, many of them from the pipefitters and electrical workers unions, are not happy with a four-year contract offer, and say they’re disappointed in how their union leaders have negotiated.
In Alberta, Cocaine Easier to Buy than Pizza
Cocaine easier to buy than pizza
Drugs, alcohol plague transient workers living on fringes of oilpatch boom towns
Amanda Ferguson, The Edmonton Journal
Published: 2:05 am
http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/story.html?id=cd92c68f-21d9-4...
Even when living in the remote work camps of northern Alberta, Ken was never far from his next fix.
If cocaine wasn't being used inside his camp of 3,000 oil workers in the outskirts of Fort McMurray, it lingered just outside in the pockets of the drug dealers who prowled outside the gates like predators.
Lubicon backed by UN Committee
Alberta's Lubicons get a boost from U.N. Human Rights Committee
Aug, 13 2007 - 4:50 PM
http://www.630ched.com/news/news_local.cfm?cat=7428109912&rem=72244&red=...
EDMONTON/630 CHED - A U.N. Committee on Human Rights is urging Canada to negotiate a long standing land claim treaty with the Lubicon Cree Nation of north central Alberta.
The U.N. Human Rights Committee wrapped up two-and-a-half weeks of hearings in Geneva, late last month, and on the agenda was the issue of Alberta's Lubicons.
Alaska offshore drilling delayed further
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20297414/
Alaska offshore drilling delayed further
Shell blocked from area off Prudhoe Bay due to lawsuit by natives,
activists
The Associated Press
Updated: 7:59 a.m. HT Aug 16, 2007
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that
Royal Dutch Shell PLC must further postpone plans for exploratory oil
drilling off the northern coast of Alaska.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also indicated that
environmental and Alaska Native groups have a good chance of
prevailing in their effort to keep the energy giant out of the
The new dirty energy-- Boston Globe
The new dirty energy
It's big, it's growing -- and it's bad for the environment. Inside the other alternative-energy movement.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2007/08/19/the_new_dirty...
By Drake Bennett | August 19, 2007
FOR THOSE WHO dream that high oil prices will help drive America toward a brave new world of clean energy, the MacKay River project in Alberta, Canada, offers a glimpse of the future.
Tar sand mining growing at huge environmental cost
Tar sand mining growing at huge environmental cost
Posted: 23 Aug 2007
http://www.peopleandplanet.net/doc.php?id=3079
Canadian tar sands deposits hold an estimated 1.7 trillion barrels of crude oil, second in the world only to Saudi Arabia, but the devastating environmental impact of mining them far exceeds that of conventional oil, says new research to be published next month (September 2007).
PWW: Mining black gold, and profits, from northern sands
Mining black gold, and profits, from northern sands
http://www.pww.org/article/articleview/11600/1/387
Imagine for a moment that you’re an American oil executive. You’re pondering the prospects for the next big oil strike overseas — and dreaming of a place where the government is stable and compliant, the royalties are low and the environmental standards minimal.
Tar Sands to start poisoning Indiana & Lake Michigan?
Oil sands plan said to draw fire
To process heavy Alberta crude, BP wants to dump up to 50% more pollutants into Lake Michigan, angering some - report.
August 23 2007: 10:48 AM EDT
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Plans to process a heavy grade of crude oil from oil sands in the Canadian province of Alberta have sparked a nasty battle in the Midwest, where some politicians are angry that the move will increase pollution in the Great Lakes, according to a report Wednesday.
Greenpeace guns for the tar sands
Greenpeace guns for the tar sands
http://www.journalofcommerce.com/article/id24064
Canada’s most “environmentally destructive” project expands
Aug. 20, 2007
EDMONTON
Greenpeace is setting up shop in Edmonton and it has set its sights on shutting down Alberta’s tar sands.
“The tar sands are one of the most environmentally destructive projects in Canada, if not the world,” said Greenpeace campaign organizer Geeta Sehgal adding they create 40 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions every year.
