Tar sands leave us aghast and committed to clean energy path
Posted June 21, 2010 in Curbing Pollution, Environmental Justice, Moving Beyond Oil, Saving Wildlife and Wild Places, Solving Global Warming
NRDC leadership returned late last week from the tar sands struck anew by the urgency of ending our addiction to fossil fuels and building a clean energy economy. What we all saw and smelt was that tar sands are as dirty as they sound. We could save far more oil than tar sands expansion will produce, and create American jobs, by just switching over homes and businesses that use oil to cleaner fuels, and giving incentives to people who buy hybrid and plug-in hybrids cars.
We had spent several days in northern Alberta, Canada seeing with our own eyes the destructive tar sands strip mines and drilling sites and the beautiful but imperiled Peace-Athabasca Delta. I introduced the trip in an earlier blog and I also detailed the stress that the Peace-Athabasca Delta is under.
My colleague Liz Barratt-Brown told of our first day in the oil “war zone” that is the heart of tar sands extraction in northern Alberta and her continuing impressions as we travelled to Ft. Chipewyan and heard of the community’s struggle to make sense of their failing health and livelihoods.
NRDC Board member Adam Albright said that he doesn’t usually blog, but was one of the first to send his impressions so strong was the urge to make sure others learned about the tar sands. Marianne Welch, an NRDC Global Leadership Council member who has worked for years on the heart-wrenching issue of Mountain Top Removal came away from the trip deeply discouraged by what she had witnessed and the many similarities to the devastation and suffering in Appalachia.
We heard from the residents of a town downstream from the Canadian tar sands mines have seen a 30% increase in cancer. Scientists have suggested a link to oil-related pollutants. In the U.S., the oil companies want to build yet another tar sands pipeline all the way from Canada to the Gulf and further feeding our addiction. But we don’t have to travel down that path. We can cut our oil consumption by more than proposed tar sands expansion and create American jobs by requiring American car makers to build cars with double the gas mileage of our current gas-guzzlers and by transitioning responsibly to safe, clean fuels that will not run out like wind and solar.
NRDC executive director Peter Lehner concluded that the solution was to move off of our dependence on fossil fuels and into a clean energy future. This trip made us know that this move beyond oil is more urgent than ever.
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Comments
Mr. Suane B. Huff — Jun 22 2010 12:46 AM
Don't let the Bush & Cheney policies continue to mess up our drinking water. I would like for you to send me some information on how and what I should do to open up a wind turbine plant in my area. I'm very concerned about the future of my town and this county and this has been on mind for awhile, one of the main reasons is because of the employment situation & location of this area and the feasibility of making it happen down here. For one thing the labor cost and the taxes will be reasonable, we also have a Jr. college, Southwest Community College, that is able to train potential employees. I have talked to my Chamber of Commerce Executive Director, Mr. Britt Herrin, and he seems very interested in the idea. The place that I represent is in Southwestern Mississippi, Pike county to be exact. I have already talked to the Mayor of McComb, MS and he told me to let him know what I come up with also. So would you please let me know something ASAP. Thank you so very much.
Suane B. Huff
Isabelle Zouhour — Jun 22 2010 12:55 AM
no one has the right to act like without respect for the nature and the human health !! Please stop this !!
sand — Jun 22 2010 08:56 AM
For folks that are new to this issue, and who are feeling the urge to write congress and specific individuals, it would be helpful to include addresses and names of specific individuals to write in order to help create a voice for these changes.
Richard Neufeld — Jun 22 2010 09:59 AM
You people are so misinformed it is laughable. How you can criticize others after your incompetent handling of the BP spill is beyond the pale. This blog post is so inaccurate and misleading, and the people who believe this nonsense are nothing more than lemmings!
jim boyd — Jun 22 2010 10:00 AM
Not one mention of the reclaimatiom of the land going on. Not one photo of the n ew plant life or the animals that roam on the reclaimed land. I know that it is not perfect and more could be done. However, the world needs the energy and wind,solar and bio-fuels all together would not make a dent in what this world consumes.
William Graham — Jun 22 2010 10:11 AM
Sirs;
Is it not interesting that you trash the Canadian Oilsands which is essentially a mining operation, versus Middle East oil which is sold to you by the same people who want to blow up your country?
Canadians as a nation due to extreme weather and vast expanses of land, do not have the economic luxury of using most alternative energies.
The USA is a long way from abandoning fossil fuels as a fuel source. Who do you want to buy oil from.....your allies and neighbours or your worst nightmares?
William Graham
Canada
David MacLean — Jun 22 2010 11:11 AM
30 per cent increase in cancer -- false. Those are quite the weasel words -- "cientists have suggested a link to oil-related pollutants"
Really? Which scientists? Which oil-related pollutants? I grew up there, so I happen to know that bitumen flows freely into the Athabasca river through the banks and has for thousands of years.
A peer reviewed study on cancer rates in this small community -- we call it Fort Chip -- showed only slightly elevated cancer rates, and lifestyle issues (tobacco, bad diet, alcholism) could not be ruled out as the cause.
And only 20 per cent of the oil sands will be mined. The remaining 80 per cent will be harvested using wells similar to conventional oil and gas.
Reality Check — Jun 22 2010 11:43 AM
So greenies..... we all drive rechargeable hybrids, plug them in at home, at work, and at the theatre. Sounds good eh?? Nobody ever mentions just how much that charge will cost in electricity nor the amount of pollution created to generate the power.
If anyone knows, they're keeping it to themselves. Why?? Betcha I can guess!!
Eric Weiss — Jun 22 2010 12:00 PM
There is no proven link to tar sands development and Cancer in Fort Chip. It was a panic instigated by one doctor who has since been proven to be a fraud. He even admitted that his statements about elevated cancer rates was based on a hunch, not empirical evidence.
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2009/11/11/national-post-editorial-board-the-power-of-misinformation-and-paranoia.aspx
There are many things to be concerned about in regards to oil sands development. It's energy consumption and GHG emmissions need to be addressed, but poor research and half-truths don't help your cause.
Rosie Outlook — Jun 22 2010 02:04 PM
The oil sands of Alberta are a NATURAL DISASTER. The mining operation cleans the oil out of the land. Did you look at the land that has yet to be mined? That land that won’t grow anything? You didn’t bother to look at the lands that have been replanted and restored, did you? Redeemed is a better word for the post mining lands. Let’s see what the post gulf will look like. If they could have drilled closer to shore they could fix it, now it is a disaster of Biblical proportions.
Judith Jaffe — Jun 22 2010 03:16 PM
Susan, the blogs of you and your colleagues give a very dramatic picture of the devastation going on the the tar sand mining and the very negative effect that is having on the environment, the delta and way of life of the First Nation people living in the area, particularly that below the mining area. This process has got to be stopped. There certainly should not be a pipeline built to deliver tar sands oil across the US. The negative comments of those who believe this is all an imaginary problem or lies are very disheartening.
NRDC should keep up its very important work in fighting the tar sands oil process and in informing the public of what is going on.
Jim Wilson — Jun 22 2010 03:36 PM
Just wondering here...if Suncor is REMOVING the oil and returning clean sand, doesn't that mean that they are reclaiming the soil? So, in essence, cleaning up the worlds largest (second) largest oil spill?
Just trying to provide a little non-emotional balance here...
Top Flight — Jun 22 2010 06:09 PM
Sorry... but this reporting is a biased and does not reflect the reality of the development of the oil sands. The oil sands are a strategic resource of immence benefit to North Americans, Canadians and Americans. The bulk new development does not rely on stripping off the overburden and there are requirements to return the mined area to its origional state.
Yes, there are problems and it is necessary to be vigilent to ensure to oil companies do indeed do what is required of them.
Alberta is capable of managing the resource without the intervention of well intentioned but misinformed outsiders.
Matt Joyce — Jun 22 2010 09:47 PM
So, if you don't want an oil pipeline from Canada to the U.S. -- and lots of American oil and gas producers don't, because they don't want any competition -- then how about an oil pipeline to the Pacific coast to ship the oil to Asia? That is, after all, the obvious alternative.
Bitumen Queen — Jun 22 2010 09:56 PM
Some new Naysayers....Oil Sands & it's product synthetic crude has been shipped to the US clean & Sulphur free since the 70s if you don't want it or the Diluted bitumen anymore we will gladly ship it elsewhere.......
Erwin Lewis — Jun 22 2010 11:03 PM
Theses tar sands are so toxic that all of their watersheds are a wasteland and the Ocean they run into is also, at least that is the impression that some of the bloggers attempt to give.
The truth is that the Athabasca River (which of course the sands are named after), has been running through the heart of the oil sands for over fifty million years, yup it sure must be really toxic, such bull. And the Arctic Ocean that the water ends up in, is very healthy too. The most unhealthy runoff into the watershed, is the large amount of baloney coming from the eco- terrorists.
As to all of the damage from the open pit mines-nonsense; the Suncor operation has been operating very successfully for over forty years. The fully restored/replanted areas are in better looking condition than the original scrubby jack pines and poplar forests, which by the way have essentially zero commercial value.
Helen Dixon — Jun 23 2010 01:59 AM
There will never be a disastrous oil spill in the Alberta oil sands for obvious reasons. Therefore, in comparison to what's happening in the gulf the oil sands are a safe and environmentally sound way of obtaining the oil we need for our world to survive economically. Please stop thinking about your own pet project long enough to think about the millions of people globally who would lose their livelihoods when the financial system collapsed due to the implementation of your obsession
One of the things the early explorers found in Alberta when they came west was a gooey, sticky substance that oozed out of the ground and the river banks into the rivers. They had no idea what to do with it. The indigenous people, however, used it to tar their canoes to make them watertight.
We are now able to extract the oil out of the sand in a cost effective way that provides Canadians and their American neighbours, and indeed many others around the globe with the oil they need to keep their economies running. There are strict guidelines for reclaiming the land, something your propaganda didn't bother to mention or show.
Many of the local indigenous people have found skilled, well paying jobs working in the oilsands. raising their standard of living above the subsistence level.
Stop the propaganda.
Helen