Posted 7-3-08

US must step up resistance to Canadian Oil Sands Imports

Dr. Brian L. Horejsi

Its true that control of Canadas publicly owned energy resources, things like conventional oil and gas, coal bed methane and Alberta’s tar sands, have largely fallen into the hands of multinational corporations, many of which call the U.S. home. This contrasts with a growing trend around the world for citizens and governments to take control of their own energy resources, cutting giant corporations out of the loop and keeping billions of dollars at home for their citizens. Part of the severe losses suffered by a country and its people that result from conceding to private control of public resources, as we in North America have done, is the false perception that growth in consumption and exploitation is somehow good for society; after all, isn’t "growth" what corporations are meant to do? It is this selfish agenda that is now fueling energy consumption and green house gas emissions (GHG) in the United States at a deadly rate.

Americans have been mesmerized by the never ending double-barreled sales pitch that we must have growth-at-all-costs and that is the only way America will ever gain the nirvana of energy "security". Yet, the fact is, no political, economic or social system that cedes control of energy resources and national security to the corporate and private sector has ever achieved this "pie in the sky" known as national energy security or stability. There can be no better example of that reality than America. When there are no or very limited legal, social or environmental controls protecting the public interest, the oil and gas industry behaves like a legal crack dealer, supplying more and more, exploiting every source possible, all while escalating the cost to the consumer. Take another look at the price of gasoline if you think otherwise. Of course, there are no end of consumers when no one intercedes on behalf of the collective interests of society, a role that only democratic government free of corporate influence can effectively play. The growth of exploitation of public resources by the oil and gas industry is a classic case of failed public leadership and greed driven incrementalism. Shielded by an army of lobbyists and emboldened by a fierce barrage of scare tactics about "national security" and propaganda about being "free" to drive gas hogs that chug a gallon to go 4 miles, the oil and gas industry has used incrementalism to force the world, not just North America, into a green house gas choke hold. Only political opportunists, and the oil and gas industry, could even suggest there is ever going to be such a thing as energy security at a nation wide level. It wasn’t there when there were 200 million North Americans and oil was $10 a barrel, and its even further away now that there are 330 million North Americans and oil is at $142 a barrel. It is simply dishonest to imply it will be there tomorrow if only we abandon our senses and sound climate and ecological sciences and import more oil from Alberta’s tar sands. Surely it has never been more apparent that the deceit and hypocrisy of the oil and gas industry is designed to keep the American people in a stuporous state; the fact is this industry and most of the people in it do not give a cats meow about smothering the earth with over consumption.

If you get a warm feeling from "pledges" to reduce GHG emissions, or "promises" that "technology will save us", or disparate claims about relativity, like emissions per barrel of oil produced are down 32% in 20 years, I suggest it’s the result of global temperature rise, not reality. These are virtually word for word the same messages, and the same messengers, we heard in the 1970s, 80s and 90s but the reality is that total GHG emissions have exploded; Up 21% in the U.S. and up 25% in Canada since 1990. And the fossil fuel industry? Up 42% in Canada since 1990.

North Americans are being subjected to a spin campaign that the desecration created by mining and steaming the Tar Sands is merely a matter of "image" control or propaganda from environmental and citizen activists. What we are really talking about, however, is an industry that knowingly and willingly is choking the life out of the earths ecosystems. Scientists point to an atmospheric threshold of 350 ppm carbon dioxide if we hope to save the world we now recognize, but we’re already at 385 ppm. Its cut back time, folks, yet we’ve got oil and gas hustlers telling us we absolutely have to burn more fossil fuel.

Congress has broadly failed to provide sufficient resistance to the oil and gas industry and its minions and subsequently shares blame for the present catastrophic global climate disruption. There are things that can be done, and limiting certain uses of tar sands oil is at least a start. Much, much more has to come, and soon. Gone will be seemingly frivolous by destructive activities and trinkets like Hummers, flying to New York for the weekend, and the blitzkreig of off road vehicles swarming over public land. Americans had best get serious about the abusive practices and factual distortions of the oil and gas industry and, like it or not, they are about to welcome a sharply downsized economy. Every 10,000 new Americans, every 10,000 more barrels of oil imports from the Alberta tar sands, every ton of carbon emissions associated with over consumption, tightens the noose around your neck and helps bid adios to the vaunted American dream. The oil and gas industry understands only numbers, so Americans ought to start using some important ones: 350 ppm CO2 is where we must go. Freeze oil imports from the destructive tar sands industry at todays level, about 1.3 million barrels per day, then slowly scale back. And start action to cap the human population of North America at no more than 350 million.

You can grab hold of the oil and gas industry bully now, and put the brakes on the political culture it has cultivated and funded, or you can let the physical and biological realities of a finite world do it for you. Choose the latter and you and the rest of America will live the metaphorical equivalent of blood and guts on the streets. Many of you will not survive.

Dr. Brian L. Horejsi
Wildlife Scientist and long ago consultant to several oil and gas corporations
Calgary, Alberta