Alberta Oil Sands Most Destructive Project on Earth

[Conrad Black]

Report: Alberta Oil Sands Most Destructive Project on Earth
http://www.desmogblog.com/report-alberta-oil-sands-most-destructive-project-on-earth

18 Feb 08
Environmental Defence has released a report calling the Alberta Oil Sands the most destructive project on Earth.

Few Canadians know that Canada is home to one of the world's largest dams and it is built to hold toxic waste from just one Tar Sands operation," Rick Smith, the executive director of Environmental Defence.

And according to the report this is just the beginning. Approvals have already been given that will double the size of existing operations and Canada's leaders have been talking with the US government to grow oil sands operations in a "short time span."

Even a former Premier of Alberta is concerned. Peter Lougheed who served as Premier from 1971 to 1985 was recently quoted on the oil sands as saying:

... it is just a moonscape. It is wrong in my judgment, a major wrong... So it is a major, major federal and provincial issue."

However, there is a silver lining in all this. A recent Canadian parliamentary committee recently stated that:

A business as usual approach to the development of the oil sands is not sustainable. The time has come to begin the transition to a clean energy future."

Here's a few facts about the Alberta Oil Sands:

Oil sands mining is licensed to use twice the amount of fresh water that the entire city of Calgary uses in a year.

- At least 90% of the fresh water used in the oil sands ends up in ends up in tailing ponds so toxic that propane cannons are used to keep ducks from landing in them.

- Processing the oil sands uses enough natural gas in a day to heat 3 million homes in Canada.

- The toxic tailing ponds are considered one of the largest human-made structures in the world. The ponds span 50 square kilometers and can be seen from space.

- Producing a barrel of oil from the oil sands produces three times more greenhouse gas emissions than a barrel of conventional oil.

- The oil sands operations are the fastest growing source of heat-trapping greenhouse gas in Canada. By 2020 the oil sands will release twice the amount produced currently by all the cars and trucks in Canada.

A full copy of the Environmental Defence report is attached to the end of this post.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

- Processing the oil sands uses enough natural gas in a day to heat 3 million homes in Canada.

of all the petroleum they extract in the same time period, how many homes can that "total energy of all oil products produced" heat in a day?

 

[Edward Skira]

The posted comments are hilarious.

The oils sands actually
SUBMITTED BY ME (NOT VERIFIED) ON TUE, 2008-02-19 07:43.
The oils sands actually REMOVE oil from the soil, thats the point the arctic in the oil sands area had always been impossible to live in because the land is A Frozen solid and B Toxic. The oil sands actually remove the oil from the land and clean the sand and then reclaim the land. It's like the Exxon Valdez only on a massive clean up scale.

# Oil sands mining is licensed to use twice the amount of fresh water that the entire city of Calgary uses in a year. - yes and it's recycled,
# At least 90% of the fresh water used in the oil sands ends up in ends up in tailing ponds so toxic that propane cannons are used to keep ducks from landing in them. - yes, what the tailing pond are bi products from the soil, salts, minerals, that you don't want ducks landing on or drinking, it's like salty mud, but it's not unnatural they recycle the water from the ponds it drys up and they bury in where they found it.
http://www.nrcan-rncan.gc.ca/com/elements/issues/2 ...

Processing the oil sands uses enough natural gas in a day to heat 3 million homes in Canada. - Yes this is true, but we don't need the gas and we do need the oil, nuclear is also an option.
http://www.energyab.com/nuclear_energy/index.html

The toxic tailing ponds are considered one of the largest human-made structures in the world. The ponds span 50 square kilometers and can be seen from space. - so? Most dam created lakes can be seen from space, this is no different, they dam it, recycle the water, what would you like them to do?

Producing a barrel of oil from the oil sands produces three times more greenhouse gas emissions than a barrel of conventional oil.
The oil sands operations are the fastest growing source of heat-trapping greenhouse gas in Canada. By 2020 the oil sands will release twice the amount produced currently by all the cars and trucks in Canada. - Yes but actually we are working on that, and I mean we as an Albertan, I have nothing to actually do with the oil sands.

But this one is really cool, the Canadian and Alberta Governments are running projects right now that force CO2 deep into the earth where it pushes the oil from the oil sands up locking the CO2 into the earth, so in the end the oil sand could be not the problem but the solution the CO2. Plus they continue to reduce their "footprint" using carbon sequestration.
http://www.oilweek.com/news.asp?ID=13902

Don't let these people scare you, come to Alberta if you don't believe me we are probably the most naturally beautiful area in North America, and we intend to keep it that way.

 

[Prometheus The Supremo]

we need to stop tar sands now! look what the fumes did to that guy's brain!

 

[299 bloor call control.]

Don't let these people scare you, come to Alberta if you don't believe me we are probably the most naturally beautiful area in North America, and we intend to keep it that way.

Oh... so.... beautiful!

(Syncrude Mildred Lake mine and processing plant)

 

[299 bloor call control.]

btw, i love my home province of Alberta. the tar sands though, piss me off.

 

[Hipster Duck]

The impact of oil sands production so far has only benefited one region of Canada disproportionately. Economically, I think that outside of Alberta and Saskatchewan, we stand to lose. Over here in Ontario, the oil sands have resulted in a shortage of skilled tradespeople and a rising Canadian dollar that threatens the competitiveness of our manufactured exports. Sitting here in Toronto, where I'm paying more money to ride around on an increasingly broken transit system, have to pay more property tax and watch the roads get more rutted and clogged every day, I don't feel as if our country is being showered with magnificent riches. It threatens to turn Atlantic Canada once and for all into a permanent pool of migrant labour, which discourages the growth of an indigenous economy in those provinces. Most of all, I am afraid that it will turn the highly diversified Canadian economy into a rather non-enterprising petro-based economy. Extracting resources from the ground sort of suffocates the kind of ingenuity and forward-thinking that light manufacturing or product design engenders. Worse, energy companies pay very small royalties to the Alberta government compared to, say, companies extracting oil and natural gas off the coast of Norway. If we are going to commit our economy to a non-renewable resource with huge environmental and political (possibly geo-political) fallout, we'd better have a rainy day fund waiting for us at the end.