Social Impacts. Overnight injections of migrant workers will not build healthy communities and can have severely adverse impacts on existing communities, especially those of indigenous nations on their traditional lands. Such development brings vices and long term displacement too often. Drugs, alcohol and associated violence spreads. Hunting becomes difficult when the land is threatened, leading to a further loss of culture and tradition. In towns like Fort McMurray there is no planning for the future, but merely consumption in the present. However transient the individuals may be, the populations will not leave, as “development” takes on a logic all its own. All levels of run away development are subordinate to that development, not social need.
U.S. Oil Giants Poised to Gain on Keystone Pipeline
By Amy Harder
Updated: August 5, 2011
Three major American oil companies are poised to gain big if the Obama administration green-lights a controversial pipeline that would send 700,000 barrels of oil a day from the oil sands of Alberta, Canada, to refineries in Texas.
Unist’hot’en Camp II
*
August 12 – 15, 2011 in Wet’suwet’en Territory *
[ updates will be posted here: http://unistotencamp.wordpress.com
]
Wet’suwet’en seeks to operate a second camp building further resistance
to the large influx of industrial activities in our Indigenous Lands and
Waters, often with no consent or consultation, or consultation as a
final stage of development. The major focus of this camp is largely
educational and hopefully strategic. Last year the major focus was Tar
Sands and Pipelines, and training for current and future activists to
operate as a larger body to resist Tar Sands and affiliated
infrastructure and systemic support of Tar Sands expansion.
N.W.T. pushes federal government to back Mackenzie pipeline
By Rebecca Penty, Postmedia News July 18, 2011
CALGARY — Ottawa needs to ink a financial deal with backers of the Mackenzie Valley natural gas pipeline project by the end of the year, the Northwest Territories' Bob McLeod said following the exit of Royal Dutch Shell PLC from the partnership.
Let's expose the structure of violence that keeps the world economy running.
With an entire planet being slaughtered before our eyes, it's
terrifying to watch the very culture responsible for this - the culture
of industrial civilization, fueled by a finite source of fossil fuels,
primarily a dwindling supply of oil - thrust forward wantonly to fuel
its insatiable appetite for "growth."
Deluded by myths of progress and suffering from the psychosis of
technomania complicated by addiction to depleting oil reserves,
Shell wants out of Mackenzie pipeline project
CBC News
Jul 15, 2011
Shell Canada is planning to pull out of the Mackenzie Valley pipeline project and sell its assets in the region.
The company is trying to sell its share in the $16.2 billion natural gas project in the Northwest Territories, according to company documents obtained by CBC News.
Shell is part of a corporate consortium, led by Imperial Oil, that is backing the proposed pipeline. Other members of the consortium are Exxon Mobil Corp., ConocoPhillips, and the Aboriginal Pipeline Group.
Opti, partner in Nexen's Long Lake plant and originally spawned by Iraeli company Ormat in order to export "cogeneration" technology (burning waste gunk in house for power, regardless of climate impacts), has filed for bankruptcy protection. Rather than be good news for anti-tar sands campaigners in Alberta, this will provide Nexen with less questions as they try to jump start a flawed project.
"Anonymous" Hackers Attack Monsanto, Tar Sands Oil Companies
by Brian Merchant, Brooklyn, New York on 07.14.11
Treehugger
The notorious activist hacking group "Anonymous" has launched two new campaigns championing a pair of green causes -- helping U.S. farmers earn the right to label their food as "GMO-free" and working to obstruct the expansion of the devastating tar sands oil project in Alberta, Canada. Monsanto, the giant biotech firm, has confirmed it was the victim of a large-scale hacking attack. And the oil companies are next, Anonymous says.
Anonymous Versus Monsanto
Conflicting signals on pipeline expansion
Report suggests U.S. has 'tipped the scales' in favor of OKing permit for 2nd leg of Keystone project; not so, official says.
By Neela Banerjee • Tribune Newspapers STLtoday.com | Posted: Thursday, July 14, 2011 12:00 am
WASHINGTON • At a town hall meeting in Pennsylvania in early April, President Barack Obama was asked about a bitter fight between industry and environmentalists over a proposed $7 billion, 2,000-mile pipeline to ship crude from Alberta's oil sands to Gulf Coast refineries.
UPDATE 3-Denali exits; TransCanada alone on Alaska pipeline
Tue, 17th May 2011 2
By Jeffrey Jones and Yereth Rosen
CALGARY/ANCHORAGE, May 17 (Reuters) - BP Plc and Conoco Phillips dropped efforts on Tuesday to build a $35 billion gas pipeline from Alaska, blaming chronically low prices as well as a technological revolution that has opened up huge supplies of natural gas much closer to big U.S. markets.
Should Alberta's cross-border oil pipeline be extended to Texas?
July 9, 2011
CBC News
Alberta's energy minister says he's going to push Ottawa to promote TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline to the U.S. government.
