Energy and how it is captured and consumed is barely viable in tar sands production. While the amount of oil in places such as the tar sands in Alberta or the Orinoco Belt in Venezuela may have deposits of similar size to the reserves of countries such as Saudi Arabia or Iraq, the return of new energy after expending energy in production is not even close. In Iraq, the process of using one barrel of oil generates 100 new barrels. In the tar sands, estimates of 3 to 1 and even as low as 1.5 to 1 have been made. Offsetting the net energy loss would require minimally 25-30 tar sands facilities for one Saudi plant operating at the same capacity.
The energy industry's Mediterranean love affair
Eni's purchase of First Calgary Petroleums is another sign of the sector's plans for Algeria and Libya. And the competition is heating up
ERIC REGULY // Globe and Mail
September 9, 2008
ROME — Algeria and Libya have gone from no-go countries to the hottest of the oil and gas hot spots in only a few years.
What $300-a-Barrel Oil Will Mean for You
Charles Maxwell, Senior Energy Analyst, Weeden & Co.
By LAWRENCE C. STRAUSS
AN INTERVIEW WITH CHARLES MAXWELL: He correctly predicted the recent price spike -- and he sees an eventual move to around $300 a barrel.
Layton targets tar sands
GLORIA GALLOWAY
Globe and Mail Update and Canadian Press
September 8, 2008
FORT SMITH, NWT — The plane carrying New Democrat Leader Jack Layton and his NDP entourage swooped over the Alberta tar sands Monday to show vast expanses of northern wilderness despoiled by development.
Ponds filled with tar and the chemicals that remain from oil extraction, forest that have criss-crossed with strips that have been cleared of trees, mines that rise out of nowhere.
An urban legend to comfort America: crash programs will solve Peak Oil
Fabius Maximus
This is the second post in a series examining “urban legends” about energy that comfort Americans. Here we discuss the first of four comforting myths about unconventional and alternative energy sources. These are excuses for not doing the hard work of gathering information, analysis, planning, and executing programs necessary to prepare for the multi-decade transition through peak oil to the next era (whatever that will be). These four myths are:
Shell puts cork in methane-drilling plans - for now
Company agrees to speak with Tahltan about natives' concerns about impact of project on northwestern B.C.
WENDY STUECK
September 6, 2008
VANCOUVER -- Shell Canada Ltd. has temporarily shelved its plans to drill for coal-bed methane in northwestern British Columbia, delaying work for at least one more season and highlighting concerns over the potential impact of the projects in the remote wilderness area.
Canada Stocks Slump Most Since January on Oil; Suncor Drops
By John Kipphoff
Sept. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Canadian stocks tumbled the most in seven months, as the biggest commodity sell-off since March dragged down oil and metal producers in the Standard & Poor's/TSX Composite Index by almost 6 percent.
Suncor Energy Inc. dropped the most in at least 15 years, leading the biggest one-day decline in energy shares since November 2001. Goldcorp Inc. slipped to a four-week low, sending raw-materials shares to the index's steepest retreat.
THE NEW SONG OF DAVID
The supreme prophet of Canada's environmental movement seems to be lowering his sights with a self-help book on how to reduce, reuse and recycle - even though 'I know we're heading straight over the cliff.' John Allemang asks David Suzuki what he's thinking.
JOHN ALLEMANG // September 6, 2008
High costs squeeze oil sands
Break-even price jumps 31%
Claudia Cattaneo, Financial Post // September 05, 2008
CALGARY -- As oil backpedalled again yesterday to a five-month low, oil sands projects are getting increasingly squeezed as soaring costs boost the break-even price.
A new report found the break-even oil price required by new mining projects in the oil sands has jumped to $85 a barrel, an increase of $20 or 31% in barely more than a year.
Warning: The author of this article is a well-known climate change denier, and advocate of wars of aggression around the planet. Nonetheless, it is interesting to read pro-war arguments for the West to use the tar sands as a weapon in their escalation of a new Cold War against Russia, which they actually claim is about "territorial integrity" and "Russian aggression". To hear advocates of the Empire (who just destroyed the "territorial integrity" of Yugoslavia and then Serbia itself? Who continues to wage war on the people of Iraq without provocation?
