It was a headline in the Toronto Star Business Section: “Now or never for oilsands, executives say.” The answer that came immediately to mind was “How about never.”
The Toronto Star story was quoting Brian Ferguson, chief executive of Cenovus Energy and Russ Girling, chief executive of TransCanada, the pipeline people. They were speaking to a Canadian Club meeting—spreading propaganda like farmers running the manure spreaders through their fields.
And it is propaganda. People who refer to the Athabasca Tar Sands as oilsands are trying to paint a false picture. TransCanada’s Girling was quoted as saying that the tar sands are responsible for only seven per cent of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions. He says that hardly makes the tar sands the world’s biggest carbon culprit. That is an interesting claim when you realize that tar sands production is currently in a slump because of the lack of transportation for the output. Using the industry’s own figures it means that the tar sands are going to be responsible for over 20 per cent of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions when they get into full production with access to pipeline and rail shipping capabilities.
At a time when the world is facing the challenge of trying to reduce global warming by reducing greenhouse gas emissions, these men are talking only about the challenge of capturing market share. They are putting their greed ahead of world need. Their only objective seems to be profit.
Their rationale is that if Canada does not supply the raw materials, the Americans will source them elsewhere. This is despite the fact that most American refineries do not want tar sands material to refine. All the proposed new or reversed or revamped pipelines are designed to export the tar sands output. TransCanada’s Keystone XL is designed to feed tankers in the Texas Gulf ports. Northern Gateway and the twinned Kinder Morgan lines in British Columbia are designed to feed Chinese tankers. The Irving interests in Saint John, New Brunswick have agreed to build a tanker port to transfer the output from the Enbridge and TransCanada eastern pipelines to ocean-going tankers.
But these seemingly smart business opportunists are going to face reality one day soon. They needed to pay attention to a news clip on television the other day about the pollution in China. The announcer explained that in the nearly deserted streets of Beijing with its more than 11 million people, the smog was at a pollution level about 20 times that which is considered safe. The Chinese really do not need to add refining tar sands bitumen to that mix.
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Copyright 2014 © Peter Lowry
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