Dirty business extracting oil

“A climate bomb” is what Bill McKibben calls the Canadian tar sands project. “Satan Land” is what the National Geographic article about it was titled. This project involves an area the size of Florida in the province of Alberta. It is rapidly converting this fertile land of forests, lakes and rivers toxic by a desperate process that ravages the land and pollutes the water, causing cancer rates among the fish and indigenous people to soar.

November 4, 2011 6:27 pm

“A climate bomb” is what Bill McKibben calls the Canadian tar sands project. “Satan Land” is what the National Geographic article about it was titled. This project involves an area the size of Florida in the province of Alberta. It is rapidly converting this fertile land of forests, lakes and rivers toxic by a desperate process that ravages the land and pollutes the water, causing cancer rates among the fish and indigenous people to soar.

The oil is contained within a layer of tarry sand. Its extraction ravages the land and contaminates millions of gallons of water a day. This process produces 3 times the amount of earth and ocean changing CO2 as conventional drilling. The proposed Keystone XL pipeline would run from Alberta through 7 states to refineries and ports in Texas. The governor of Nebraska officially opposes it because it could contaminate the Oglala aquifer upon which they rely for farming, etc.

The company Sunco has a very poor record in this regard. The application for approval of the pipeline is on President Obama’s desk awaiting his signature. It will be a great tragedy if he signs it. Here is a link for a look at the operation: Tar Sands Oil Extraction – The Dirty Truth, You Tube video.

Gary Piazzon
Coupeville