Climate Change / Emissions

*Ottawa, Canada, February 19, 2009 –* United States President Barack Obama
is meeting today with Prime Minister Stephen Harper of Canada for his first
foreign visit as a President. The main discussion will center on trade
between the two nations as well as topics of environment, climate and energy
security in North America. Obama's concerns about implementing an agenda for
a clean and green energy economy highlights' Canada's oil sands, a vast
potential oil source that comes at a big cost to the environment and the

INTERVIEW-
NASA's Hansen concerned about Canada's oil sands
Wed Feb 18, 2009 5:41pm GMT

By Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent

WASHINGTON, Feb 18 (Reuters) - Canada's oil sands are an environmental "wild card," NASA's James Hansen said in an interview before President Barack Obama's trip to Ottawa, where energy and climate change will be on the agenda.

As director of the U.S. space agency's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York City, with a focus on climate change, Hansen has long opposed the burning of oil, gas and coal for their contribution to global warming.

Canada’s Tar-Sands Oil Can Be ‘Clean,’ Obama Says
By Jim Efstathiou Jr.

Feb. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Oil extracted from tar sands in Canada can be made a clean energy source, and the U.S. will work with its northern neighbor to develop the technology, President Barack Obama said.

Oilsands producers gird for Obama’s Canada visit
By Ayesha Rascoe, Reuters
February 17, 2009

WASHINGTON -- Canada’s oilsands industry, battered by collapsing oil prices, also faces the prospect of ballooning costs as the United States and Canada prepare to discuss energy security and efforts to fight global warming.

When U.S. President Barack Obama visits Ottawa Thursday, energy will be a key topic in his talks with Canada Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who often touts Canada as an emerging energy superpower due to its massive oilsands resources.

Dirtier oil sands Coming

By SHAWN BELL, SRJ Reporter 17.FEB.09

The Alberta government has tried sneaking through a policy allowing the oilsands to get even dirtier, according to the Pembina Institute, an Alberta environmental think-tank.
The new policy allows in-situ oilsands operations to burn bitumen, petroleum coke or asphaltenes instead of natural gas to produce steam, processes that increase air emissions by 40 to 66 per cent. The policy was posted to the Alberta Environment website on Dec. 23, 2008, with a deadline for public feedback set for Feb. 13, 2009.

Dirty Tar Sands in Canada to Test Obama Green Goals
By Jim Efstathiou Jr.

Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Petroleum extracted from tar sands in Canada may provide the first foreign-policy test for President Barack Obama’s environmental agenda.

U.S. and Canadian conservationists have called on Obama to reject any bid to exempt the oil from proposed climate-protection rules when he visits Canada Prime Minister Stephen Harper this week in Ottawa, his first meeting with a head of government.

Prentice 'optimistic' gas project will begin soon

Updated Sun. Feb. 15 2009 1:11 PM ET

CTV.ca News Staff

Environment Minister Jim Prentice says he is "optimistic" that work on the controversial Mackenzie Gas Project, which proposes building a pipeline to deliver northern natural gas to Canadian and U.S. markets, will begin soon after numerous delays for environmental and community assessments.

The project was first proposed in 2001 by a consortium of oil producers that includes Imperial Oil, ExxonMobil Corp., Shell Canada and ConocoPhillips.

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
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
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.