Home/Posts Tagged ‘tar sands’
Posts Tagged ‘tar sands’
Climate Change, Politics, Pollution, Videos & Documentaries, Jun 5th, 2012,
As controversial as the Keystone XL pipeline is, it could get worse. Now Canadian PM Stephen Harper is looking to sell Alberta tar sands oil to China, which would involve another massive pipeline to carry the oil west to the Pacific coast. The problem is the pipeline would cross some pristine wilderness and that is a worrying prospect to environmentalists and anyone who gives a damn about not polluting heavily, destroying nature, etc. What’s more is that in order to expedite oil extraction and exportation Harper is rewriting Canada’s environmental regulations. From the Washington Post: The government has added…
Tags: Alberta, Canada, China, Pacific, pipeline, tar sands
Climate Change, Politics, Mar 6th, 2012,
Canada is famous for ice hockey. That, maple syrup and being a nicer, cleaner version of the United States. But real, traditional ice hockey, played outdoors on frozen lakes and ponds, may become a thing of the past due to climate change. Of course, nowadays expensive, energy-consuming technology makes weather obsolete. I mean, even the state of Florida has two ice hockey teams. Winter sports have really taken off in the Sunshine State. But way up north some traditional winter sports are on thin ice, with winter temperatures in some parts of Canada not allowing sufficient ice formation. And climate…
Tags: Alberta, Canada, Climate change, greenhouse gas, hockey, ice hockey, tar sands
Pollution, Videos & Documentaries, Feb 24th, 2012,
Not to Canada bash, but the North American Country – known the world over as much kinder, gentler and more just in comparison to its neighbor, the big bad US of A – has been grabbing a few headlines lately for its deteriorating (or at least more conspicuously poor) environmental record. And let’s be real. Environmental pollution is also a social justice issue. Coal kills people as well as animals and plants. Never mind greenhouse gases. Likewise the tar sands in Alberta. Likewise poisonous emissions from chemical plants on Canada’s Great Lakes. So, without further ado, on to the bashing,…
Tags: Canada, environment, Pollution, tar sands
Climate Change, Politics, Pollution, Feb 20th, 2012,
The oil reserves of the Canadian province of Alberta are second in size only to those of Saudi Arabia. They are also more polluting and expensive to extract. In response to the European Union’s plans to label oil imports from Alberta’s tar sands as ‘highly polluting’, which they are, Canada has threatened a ‘trade war’ with Europe. Recent revelations of collusion between the UK and Canadian governments with fossil fuel companies who source their oil from the tar sands show plans to use underhanded tactics to mitigate any damage to the ‘Canadian brand’ of oil. In short, they’d like to…
Tags: Alberta, Canada, EU, Europe, oil, pipeline, tar sands
Climate Change, Politics, Pollution, Oct 7th, 2010,
Members of the Cree Nation have come to London in order to draw attention to the plight of their native lands in Canada. Alberta, Canada’s oil sands or ‘tar sands’ are the world’s largest deposits of bitumen, a heavy, black form of crude oil, previously considered too costly and difficult to extract. Yet with pressure to get off ‘foreign’ oil and the high fuel prices of the last decade, extracting bitumen via surface mining has become more economically viable, despite its high environmental and human costs. What’s happening in Alberta is shocking when witnessed: dirty stretches of smoking wasteland, dotted…
Tags: Alberta, bitumen, Canada, Cree, oil, oil sands, tar sands
Climate Change, Politics, Pollution, Aug 27th, 2010,
Poor BP. After the Deepwater Horizon mishap they have been tarred by their own brush, so to speak. But lets face it, despite BP’s exceptionally bad safety record, it’s a bad brush all around; whether you’re a pelican in the Gulf of Mexico or a person living beside Alberta’s tar sands or in the Niger River Delta. Of course BP has the well-deserved worst rap at this point in time and so they won’t be able to share in the spoils of the next – and probably last – oil frontier: the pristine icy waters of the Arctic. The company…
Tags: arctic, BP, Cairn, Climate change, Deepwater, disaster, energy, greenland, Gulf, Horizon, Mexico, oil, tar sands
Climate Change, Nature, May 10th, 2010,
According to Greenpeace, petrol stations in the European Union sell fuel derived from the oil sands of Northeastern Alberta, Canada. A Greenpeace report entitled ‘Tar Sands in Your Tank: Exposing Europe’s role in Canada’s dirty oil trade’ claims that petroleum products from the tar sands are regularly entering EU markets. Canada’s tar sands oil extraction project is considered by many to be one of the worst ‘ecocides‘ perpetrated against the environment. BP, in an effort to draw attention away from the Deepwater Horizon oil leak disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, has been talking up oil sand extraction as a…
Tags: BP, Canada, crude, ecocide, Europe, Greenpeace, Gulf, oil sands, tar sands
Climate Change, Politics, Mar 1st, 2010,
British companies with financial ties to Canada’s controversial tar sands oil operations will face considerable pressure this week from UK environmental lobbies and investors with ethical concerns. The tar sands of Alberta, Canada are the world’s largest deposits of bitumen, a heavy, black form of crude oil extracted via surface mining. Generally considered to be of more harm to the environment than conventional oil drilling, tar sand mining has taken a heavy toll on Alberta’s air, land, water, wildlife and people. According to an article in the Guardian, ethical and environmental groups opposed to British investment in the tar sands…
Tags: Alberta, British, Canada, Co-operative, environmental, ethical, Fair Pensions, Guardian, mining, oil, tar sands, UK
Climate Change, Oct 6th, 2009,
Last September 15th, members of Greenpeace Canada infiltrated the Albian tar sands and shut themselves within the dump trucks and crane cabs used onsite, effectively ceasing all activities for about 30 hours. Tar or Oil sands are one of the dirtiest ways to extract fossil fuel from the earth, involving the destruction of the boreal forests (to reach the oil deposits), constant refining and burning and toxic waste dumping. These facilities are said to expel over 100 million tons of carbon per day. It is clear that world leaders still need to get the message,” said a spokesperson from the…
Tags: carbon emissions, Climate change, Greenpeace, tar sands