Canada

A new study has found that certain types of chemical pollutants emitted by Canada's oilsands tailing ponds have gone underreported for years.

Using a computer simulation model, two University of Toronto scientists also found the pollutants in question are blowing off mine sites or evaporating from nearly two dozen impoundments containing a billion cubic metres of toxic waste.
 

TORONTO, Mar 17 2014 (IPS) - Job cuts totalling 1,000 announced at Environment Canada’s climate change division this month means there will be even fewer government scientists onboard to monitor the impact of the extraction, development and transportation of crude oil from the carbon-intensive oil sands in Alberta.

CALGARY - The proposed Energy East pipeline won't be the boon to Eastern Canadian refineries that supporters claim because the vast majority of the oil in it would be bound for export markets, environmental groups argued in a report released Tuesday. The $12-billion project would likely use the lion's share of its 1.1 million barrel per day capacity to send unrefined oilsands crude to markets like India, Europe and possibly the United States, says the report, penned by The Council of Canadians, Ecology Action Centre, Environmental Defence and Equiterre.

Climate-change skeptics -- and everyone else in Canada -- had better bundle up. Research shows extended cold snaps like we’ve seen this winter could be a direct result of climate change. In a Rutgers University paper published last year, researchers Jennifer Francis and Stephen Vavrus wrote that the melting of Arctic ice was weakening the jet stream, the band of fast-moving wind that separates colder northern air from warmer air further south. As it weakens, it dips southward for longer periods than in the past, bringing icy-cold air with it for increasingly long stays.

The Alberta government plans to include oil and gas companies in consultations on the new school curriculum. School boards were asked to come up with groups to provide input on what children should learn. The Edmonton Public School Board plans to ask oilsands companies Suncor and Syncrude what to teach children in kindergarten to Grade 3. "What are we looking for in the graduates of tomorrow. Certainly we have a perspective but we need to hear all stakeholders," said Mark Liguori, assistant superintendent of schools for Edmonton Public.

Yesterday, Canadian pipeline behemoth Enbridge won government approval for its plans for 9B, one of the most contentious pipes in pipe business. While it doesn’t get much press, 9B is important because it’s part of a hot, new trend in trans-national pipe dreams: Skirting environmental review, and public scrutiny, by pumping dirty crude through existing pipelines rather than building new ones.

The Canadian government is increasingly worried that the growing clout of aboriginal peoples’ rights could obstruct its aggressive resource development plans, documents reveal.

Since 2008, the Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs has run a risk management program to evaluate and respond to “significant risks” to its agenda, including assertions of treaty rights, the rising expectations of aboriginal peoples, and new legal precedents at odds with the government’s policies.

The anti-environment offensive by Canada’s fossil fuel industry and its flacks in government is radically shifting the political landscape of the country. Each day, it seems, brings some new announcement and outrage being committed against Earth and the humans. More pipelines to be built, and more leaks and cover-ups of existing oil and tar sands facilities that poison the land and water.

When a tight oil boom invaded rural Alberta five years ago, Diana Daunheimer was, as she puts it, just another "ignorant landowner." The mother of two and vegetable farmer knew little about the practice of horizontal drilling or multi-stage hydraulic fracturing. The practice involves the injection of highly pressurized fluids into mile deep wells that later mole out horizontally for another mile or two, in order to break open shale rock as tight as granite.

When you hear folks expressing opinions on national television you may not be aware of who helps pay their mortgages -- or golf club memberships.

On CBC's The National, last week, the "At Issue" panel was discussing the recent leaders' meeting in Mexico where, yet again, Prime Minister Harper failed to convince President Obama to give his blessing to the Keystone XL pipeline.