It is falsely assumed that big projects equal lots of jobs and, by extension, labour peace if not outright satisfaction. The size and scope of the tarsands means for incredibly dangerous work conditions-- some fatalities at the plants have already occurred. The products seldom get their "value added" in union-run locations, instead the heavy bitumen can be shipped to many different locations across North America for refining, denying benefits to the union. However, the Union does not represent the "guest worker", now being imported in increasing numbers as legislation is changed to make access easier, the term of exploitation last longer, without any new efforts or pathways to deciding to stay after helping tear up the earth.
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
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.
January 7, 2008
Impacting Unimpaired
New agreements like the SPP and TILMA are aimed directly at unimpeded extraction in the tar sands
by Macdonald Stainsby
The Dominion - http://www.dominionpaper.ca
Medicine at the crossroads of energy and climate change
by Dan Bednarz, Ph.D. and Kristin Bradford, M.D., M.P.H.
[all citations listed can be found at the url posted at the end of the article]
Still no interest in exploring high Arctic: official
Last Updated: Friday, January 4, 2008 | 9:36 AM CT
CBC News
Companies have yet to take up the federal government's invitation to explore the high Arctic for oil and gas, even though that invitation has been extended for the sixth year in a row.
Richard Casey, an official with the federal Indian and Northern Affairs Department, told CBC News that there has been no interest from any company to explore for oil and gas around Axel Heiberg Island, located west of Ellesmere Island in Nunavut, or in any surrounding areas.
Hear no peak
by David Strahan
Letter to the Financial Times
Sir:
Just as the Financial Times’ news coverage of oil was beginning to improve (“Oil watchdog reworks reserves forecasts”, 27.12.07), Lex goes and spoils it with a truly shoddy analysis: “Peak no evil” (03.01.08) rehearsed all the old myths that have been comprehensively debunked in recent years.
Fuelling Disaster: Beyond Alberta’s Culture of Resource Dependence
by Gordon Laird, Parkland Institute Editorialist Alberta
Sobering thoughts
Court ruling means Alberta's recreational drug users risk their jobs
By MINDY JACOBS // Fri, January 4, 2008
Casual pot smokers in Alberta who want to work in safety-sensitive positions had better pack up and move to Ontario. They're no longer welcome in the oilpatch.
A ruling by the Alberta Court of Appeal gives the green light to companies to fire -- or refuse to hire -- recreational pot users if they pose a potential safety risk.
Government foreign worker office long overdue - but still misses the point
Labour cautiously optimistic over government's foreign worker advocates
EDMONTON, Dec. 10 /CNW/ - The Alberta Federation of Labour reacted with
guarded optimism to the Government's new measures announced today to protect
temporary foreign workers.
The two special advisory offices for temporary foreign workers are a
welcome - if long overdue - measure," says AFL President Gil McGowan. "The AFL
had set up its own temporary foreign workers' advocate office last spring as a
Sex workers cashing in on Alberta's oil boom
Last Updated: Monday, April 16, 2007 | 3:30 AM MT
CBC News
Alberta's red-hot economy appears to be fuelling a flourishing sex trade as prostitutes follow men to the oil and gas fields.
And they're making big money when they get there, the sex-trade workers say.
"Truckers are big business and they're on the road for long stretches of time and they want to have adult entertainment," says Chastity, one of the strippers frequently seen working the bars in small boomtowns such as High Level, Alta.
