More disputes arising on the environmental impact of oil sands development 

BY GARY PARK FOR GREENING OF OIL  

A series of spats is breaking out across the United States-Canada border over the environmental evils—real or imagined—of the Alberta oil sands.
Alberta Environment Minister Rob Renner has generated some heated response to his efforts to dissuade Northeastern and Midwest states from copying California by adopting new low-carbon fuel standards.

Meanwhile, the City of Bellingham, in Washington State, has voted unanimously to reconsider what fuel it buys for its vehicle fleet, pointing a finger directly at the “high carbon fuels such as those derived from the Canadian tar sands.”

A number of states are weighing laws similar to 2008 legislation in California which would force refiners to cut back on the volumes of oil sands production that they process, or buy offsets or credits.

In a recently signed memorandum of understanding, the states have told the U.S. government that unless it imposes national standards they will act independently.

Renner, on a four-day trip to the United States this month to trumpet his government’s environmental performance, said the states could ensure that whatever actions they take do not have the “unintended consequence” of driving away investment in technology that could reduce greenhouse gas emissions. 

Environmentalists not impressed

He failed to win friends among environmentalists.

Susan Casey-Lefkowitz, international program director at the Natural  Resources Defense Council, scorned Renner’s use of taxpayers’’ money to “undermine efforts to build a clean energy economy.”

She said Renner’s job as environment minister should be to “build a clean energy economy, work on fighting climate change, work on environmental problems, not to promote something as dirty and destructive as the tar sands.”

Renner said Alberta was not trying to tell other jurisdictions what they should and shouldn’t do.

“It’s up to us to ensure that as they make policy decisions, they do so in the context of thorough and balanced information,” including recognition of the fact that Alberta’s climate change policies have lowered emissions per barrel of oil produced, he said.

Bellingham, with a population of 76,000, has highlighted the growing pressure on the oil sands, despite adopting a resolution that cannot take effect until the city’s current fuel supply contract ends in 2015. 

Pipeline carrying crude from oil sands draws attention

The issue arose as council members became aware that Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain pipeline, which is increasingly carrying oil sands production from Edmonton to Vancouver,  has a spur extension into Washington state, two miles of which run under public land in Bellingham.

The council vote was spurred by environmental group ForestEthics, which has been lobbying Fortune 500 companies over the past year to cut any links with the oil sands and has persuaded grocery chain Whole Foods to look for ways to reduce its purchase of fuel that can be traced to the oil sands.

Another protest was staged June 16 at stores across North America run by Lush, the soap and beauty products retailer which has a partnership with environmental group Rainforest Action Network, that is organizing protests against the oil sands which has been described as “the most destructive project on Earth.”

The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, as part of its attempt to rebuff attacks on the oil sands, issued a 1,000-word news release saying the Lush protest was “based on misinformation, rhetoric, not facts.”

The industry insists a barrel of oil from the oil sands, when measured from well-to-wheels, or end-use consumption, results in only 10 percent more emissions than the average barrel of crude imported into the U.S., based on data from Cambridge Energy Research Associates.

CAPP estimates that oil sands producers have reduced their emissions per barrel by more than one-third over the past two decades and are continuing to make headway. 

Editor’s note: Oil sands are not ‘tar’ sands. Tar is a manufactured substance. The bitumen that is extracted in northern Alberta is a hydrocarbon, thus it is the ‘oil’ sands industry. 

Contact Gary Park via publisher@greeningofoil.com