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.
Pipeline could bring needed revenue to state
By Aaron Nelson
Black Hills Pioneer
BELLE FOURCHE - A crude oil pipeline that would become the longest in North America and could bring much needed revenue and as many as 2,000 workers to the western region of the state would pass through Butte County, officials told county commissioners on Wednesday.
POLITICS: Rhetoric and Reality Clash on Obama's First Foreign Visit
By Chris Arsenault
VANCOUVER, Feb 20 (IPS) - On his first foreign visit as U.S.
president, Barack Obama's rhetoric of "hope" and "change" came face to
face with the hard, divisive policy realities of climate change from
Canada's tar sands, a growing insurgency in Afghanistan and the
sputtering world economy.
Some 2,500 spectators lined the streets of Ottawa to watch the
president's motorcade make its way to Parliament Hill, a marked
Such an article as the one below is a very good thing to see, in a certain sense. It means, of course, that stage one & two of social action against the tar sands have now been passed: stage one is they ignore you, and two is they ridicule you. Three, of course-- so goes the old saying, anyhow-- is that we are violently opposed.
If this is not a set-up by the RCMP and/or associated folks, then the bomber is a moron. Either way, this will be used to come after dissent, especially mere moments after the announcement that security costs wold go up five times the planned amount for 2010. The need is for "security" forces to have something to be "secure" from.
--M
Two people reportedly hurt in pipeline blast near Fort St. John
Canwest News Service
February 20, 2009
Damage caused to a natural gas pipeline is seen east of Dawson Creek in this October 12, 2008 photo.
Photograph by: Canwest News Service
*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
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.
Funding encourages Baker Lake residents to comment on Areva proposal
Last Updated: Monday, February 16, 2009
CBC News
Some last-minute funding helped about 70 people in Baker Lake, Nunavut, give a regulatory board their thoughts on a uranium mine proposal in the area.
The proposal by Areva Resources Canada Inc. is undergoing a screening by the Nunavut Impact Review Board. The board has extended its deadline for accepting public comments to Feb. 18, at the request of the territorial government.
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.
MacKenzie Pipeline one step closer
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Backers of a proposed natural gas pipeline down the Mackenzie Valley in the Northwest Territories have received some good news.
Imperial Oil has worked out a tentative deal on land access with the one remaining aboriginal stake holder not yet on board. The deal still has to be ratified by Dehcho First Nation communities, which cover about 40 per cent of the pipeline's route, in the southwest corner of the terriroties.
