[quote]If Canada has the third largest proven oil reserves in the world, why is our country in such massive debt?[/quote]
After all, as our government will tell you, we are the Saudi Arabia of the North.
Right?
Canada leaking oil profits
While the tar sands do create much-needed jobs for some, for the most part Canadians get nothing for handing over our oil reserves to foreign oil companies to ship overseas. Most countries ask oil companies for a large percentage of their profits in exchange for access to the country’s oil.
Canada gets all the environmental impacts and few of the benefits from operations like this one in Fort McMurray, Alberta (photo: Chris Krüg)
The longterm outlook for Norway is very different from ours. Despite having only the 22nd largest proven oil reserves, Norway is on track to have stowed away more than $1 trillion for their people and future generations. Note: that is a “t”rillon, not a “b”illion. As the Business Insider said just today, “Norway has more money than it knows what to do with.”
Canada a Petro-State?
Why has it come to this you ask? Why is Canada so oil-rich, but so poor?
I would propose that our politicians are to blame. And Stephen Harper is the latest in a long parade of politicians who rely on the deep pockets of the oil industry to fund their political campaigns. If a politician was to propose higher royalties for oil and gas companies, they would see campaign money dry up from not only the oil companies, but the companies behind them, like the banks and large investment firms.
However, if a leader was to emerge and demand that we make the tar sands work for Canadians and not PetroChina, Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell and British Petroleum, that person could reap the support of millions of Canadians who agree with this injustice.
If we had a leader that stood up for Canadians, instead of oil companies, we too could have more money than we know what to do with and could start to repair the damage wrought on us by politicians addicted to oil.
The Common Sense Canadian is proud to introduce Kevin Grandia as a new contributor!
In the 1980s, oil companies looked to the Arctic and made plans to drill in ecologically sensitive areas like Lancaster Sound. The sound is icebound for much of the year, but during its brief summer months, it offers near-constant sunlight, providing habitat for birds, fish and mammals to flourish. Fossil fuel exploration and development would threaten that entire web of life.
For a Nature of Things television episode called “Arctic Oil”, I interviewed a spokesman for Panarctic, one of the companies that wanted to drill in this unforgiving environment. Pressing his pencil onto a map of the projected site, he said the environmental consequences of a single test well were insignificant, less than the impact of the dot. He was probably right.
For a program on the proposed Great Whale Dam in Northern Quebec, Hydro Quebec’s CEO showed me a map and offered a similar argument: Although the dam would flood thousands of hectares, considering the massive size of the largely uninhabited north, it was a small area. Again, he may have been right, in a limited sense. But while the human population was sparse, I saw the area as fully occupied by countless plants and animals that had evolved to thrive in that specific location, and people who had lived there for millennia.
This illustrates a fundamental flaw in the environmental assessment process: It focuses on each proposed development as something that stands alone. But an individual well or dam is not separate or isolated from its surroundings – air, water, plants and animals pay no attention to our imposed, artificial boundaries.
We only have limited understanding of the exquisite ways in which everything on Earth is interconnected. Suppose environmental assessments had been conducted before we sprayed DDT onto open fields or topped up spray cans with CFCs. We didn’t know about biomagnification or chlorine degradation of the ozone layer until long after these technologies were approved. This is a fundamental problem. We can’t anticipate long-term consequences of any major technology if we are ignorant of how the world works and too impatient to invest the time and effort to learn more through scientific research.
A second defect in the EA process is the case-by-case examination of projects as if there were no collective impacts. In Alberta, energy review boards rubber-stamp proposals to drill wells. Again, each individual well might have a tiny effect on surroundings, but wells drag a lot with them, including seismic lines, electrical wires and roads that later entice hunters and adventurers in four-wheel-drive vehicles.
A lawsuit launched by the Beaver Lake Cree Nation, described by Carol Linnitt in a DesmogBlog article, illustrates the problem. The Beaver Lake people are suing the federal and provincial governments for failing to uphold indigenous rights, guaranteed by treaties and the Constitution, to fish, hunt, trap and gather plants and medicines. The BLCN contends that “cumulative impacts” of the Alberta tar sands are destroying activities governments are legally bound to protect.
BLCN lands cover an area the size of Switzerland and overlap the tar sands. The territory now yields 560,000 barrels of oil a day. Industry wants to raise that to 1.6 million. BLCN land already has 35,000 oil and gas sites, 21,700 kilometres of seismic lines, 4,028 kilometres of pipelines and 948 kilometres of road. Traditional territory has been carved into a patchwork quilt, with wild land reduced to small pieces between roads, pipes and wires, threatening animals like woodland caribou that can’t adapt to these intrusions.
As Alberta scientist David Schindler and others point out, provincial and federal government programs monitoring the impacts of tar sands development on air, water and land are so desultory that the data they collect are essentially meaningless. This echoes the federal government’s evasive approach to climate change. The idea seems to be that if proper studies aren’t conducted, we won’t learn what’s happening, so we can ignore any problems. That can’t go on.
The BLCN court case makes us look at the impact of development in a cumulative, holistic way. As BCLN lawyer Jack Woodward said, the case “is based on protection of the entire ecosystem.” If we don’t take that perspective, our hacking away with small cuts will destroy the underpinnings of the whole system.
Premier Christy Clark tours BC’s natural gas industry during 2013 election campaign (photo: Justin Tang/CP)
I started the week pissed off – make that Tuesday morning when I saw an article in the Province from a guy named Marsden who writes in the Calgary Herald and tells us in British Columbia that we ought to be grateful for the opportunity of transporting Alberta’s Tar Sands – that atmosphere-ravisher and source of catastrophic leaks – to market. I don’t begrudge him his opinion – what I’m sick to death of is the Postmedia press.
Where the hell are the sharp-eyed journalists of old that would have eaten this guy alive? Our local guys are almost all let go. We have no political cartoonist unless you count Harrop in the Sun, who’s incapable of drawing faces, and we have two editorial pages that serially kiss the ass of business. On the question of cartoonists, where is Krieger, who is brilliant? The last time I asked that question the Province sued me – yet, I ask again, where is Krieger?
I ask the editors of the two excuses for newspapers this simple question: would you please scour the morgue and find me one line of criticism editorially or by your two political columnists of fish farms, “run of river projects” and the slow-but-steady bankrupting of BC Hydro, of pipelines and tanker traffic? Just a line.
I recognize that Palmer and Smyth have families to feed and kids to educate and were I in their shoes I probably would write what my editor wanted and I would ignore topics that were, wink, wink, off limits. But, gawdamitey, Palmer almost singlehandedly brought NDP premier Glen Clark down and did so by holding his feet to the fire. Nothing sensational, just good old journalistic skepticism.
What happened? Ten years on the NDP’s case but, since 2001, 12 years of canoodling with the Liberals!
The week got worse when Damien sent me some stuff about out of province corporate donations from oil barons to both the BC Liberal Party and the NDP.
And where did he get this information? From the Vancouver Sun? Nay.
From the Province, then?
Nay again, it was from 24 Hours – the throwaway free paper which, along with Metro and the occasional bit in the BC section of the Toronto Globe and Mail (it is very occasional), are the “journals of record” for this news-starved province.
One man, Allan Paul Marking, an Alberta Oil dude, gave $150,000 to the Liberals. Alberta oil companies Encana and Cenovus gave them $68,000 and Texas based Spectra Energy gave $33,000. Many made donations to the NDP too, just in case.
No one can be surprised at these gifts – after all it’s all neat and legal. What I do criticize is the lack of mainstream media attention.
This isn’t brain surgery here. The man who pays the piper calls the tune. If you think that this money doesn’t make Premier Clark think nice things about them when she’s making her pipeline decisions, you must believe in the Great Pumpkin.
What is extraordinary about all this is that for the public to get the truth they must read online journals like this one and thetyee.ca, which, along with many others, do a first class job. They may not get the readership of the Postmedia papers – yet – but that’s because the old papers do stuff on cars, stock markets, real estate, etc, that are beyond the ken of these websites.
It’s bad enough that we have such crappy papers that rely on “foreign” columnists, but the killer is that the great issues of the world pass unnoticed and uncriticized. The press has unusual protection, constitutionally giving them wide freedoms to keep the “establishment” reasonably covered, yet they consistently flout these rights and have become house organs for big business, government and the “establishment” in general.
Petronas/Progress Energy’s proposed LNG plant on Lelu Island, near Prince Rupert, BC (artist’s rendering)
You would think Malaysian energy giant Petronas would have learned a lesson from fellow fossil fuel pipeline and coastal export terminal proponent Enbridge’s “disappearing islands” debacle last year. Enbridge was caught downplaying the risks of its Northern Gateway proposal by making 1,000 square km of islands vanish from the Douglas Channel in a digital animation of its tanker route from Kitimat.
Curiously, Petronas is following in Enbridge’s infamous footsteps with a blatantly inaccurate project description document for its proposed Pacific Northwest LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas) terminal near Prince Rupert. The document, submitted earlier this year to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency (CEAA) by Petronas’ newly-bought Canadian subsidiary, Progress Energy, made Canada’s second largest salmon river, the Skeena, disappear.
The inaccurate map was later corrected via a statement on CEAA’s website,but remains within the original project description document. The two maps are shown here, side-by-side.
West Coast Environmental Law, acting on behalf of its client, T. Buck Suzuki Foundation – an intervener in the LNG project’s environmental review – is calling for an extension to the now-closed window for public comment on Petronas’ project description and applications for funding for concerned groups and individuals to engage with future environmental hearings. In an August 14 letter to the federal agency overseeing the review, staff lawyer Andrew Gage wrote:
[quote]Notice is a key requirement of procedural fairness, and an inaccurate map that fails to indicate the proximity of the project to such a key environmentally significant feature fundamentally undermines that requirement…In our view, the Agency has an obligation to invite further public input related to the draft EIS and further opportunity to apply for participant funding.[/quote]
The mighty Skeena River, which flows from the Sacred Headwaters, near the community of Iskut in northwest BC, to the Pacific Ocean near Prince Rupert, is in dire straits these days. Its once-plentiful salmon stocks are in their worst condition in several decades this season, raising concerns about the impact of Petronas’ enormous proposed LNG terminal and associated tanker traffic through vital estuary habitat.
Central to that habitat is the second largest intact eel grass bed in BC, located at Flora Bank, right next to Petronas’ proposed project on Lelu Island. Out-migrating salmon smolts depend on this eel grass sanctuary to adjust to saltwater habitat as they head out to sea.
For this very reason, a proposed coal terminal on a neighbouring island was rejected by federal fisheries officers 40 years ago. A May, 1973 report summarized the likely impacts on key habitat from the smaller project: “Inverness Passage, Flora Bank and De Horsey Bank, in that order, are habitats of critical importance for the rearing of juvenile salmon. The construction of a superport at the Kitson Island-Flora Bank site would destroy much of this critical salmon habitat.”
West Coast Environmental Law’s contention is that groups and individuals who would have otherwise been concerned about impacts of Petronas’ plant on the Skeena River may not have made submissions to the initial call for comments and intervener funding, based on misleading information about the project. “As a result of these inaccurate notices, it may well be that individuals who might be concerned about the Skeena River may have failed to appreciate the Project’s proximity to the river and failed to make comments, or to apply for participant funding, as a result.”
It remains to be seen whether CEAA acknowledges these complaints and determines further opportunity for public engagement is required as a result.
An inferno rages before a statue of Jesus Christ on the morning of July 6, 2013 in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec
It’s near inconceivable a 10,000-tonne train more than a kilometre long carrying 79 cars could start moving on its own steam up a hill. But that’s what a train did one month ago, according to official record. The ill-fated journey ended 12 kilometres down the track with an inferno in a place called Lac-Mégantic killing 47 people.
To date, the official narrative of the Lac-Mégantic disaster says it was because of insufficient braking the train rolled down a hill. But this topographic map of the area shows there’s no steep hill to speak of in the area. The train route (shown on the map as a black dotted line) was constructed to accommodate the lay of the land. Because of this, the train route meanders through the lowest, most level elevations.
This infographic produced by academics commissioned by the National Post is the most detailed depiction of the events published so far. The topography map, coupled with this infographic, prompts a deeper exploration of the train route via Google Earth, as the National Post infographic is simply an illustration of events instead of a fact-based depiction using actual data. Precise graphs for the entire route are retrievable through tools available on Google Earth.
According to Google Earth (a tool used by professionals the world over) the terrain at Nantes, Quebec, where the train was tied down for the night does not have any steep decline that might cause a runaway train. In fact, quite the opposite is true. As we will see, and the grade at the start is sloped toward Nantes, not Lac-Mégantic.
If the doomed train was staged at Nantes and rolled up hill toward Lac-Mégantic, it would have encountered another considerable uphill grade before the forces of gravity would enable the fate-filled journey as for the official runaway narrative. If the train was tied down in Nantes properly as reports indicate, it would have rolled away from Lac-Mégantic. The National Post infographic, however, has the train placed just outside of Nantes and closer to Lac-Mégantic. Even so, the train would still need to roll uphill in order to move toward Lac-Mégantic.
On top of this, seven kilometres after the uphill climb at Laval-Nord there exists a sharp curve at the foot of a long steady decline. If the train was a runaway at the speeds reported, this curve in the train track was impossible to negotiate without derailing. In fact, the curve at Laval-Nord is a much sharper curve than where the actual derailment occurred in Lac-Mégantic.
These anomalies which counter the official runaway narrative exist only after we overlook a number of other outstanding circumstances before the train even starts rolling. Perhaps the most mystifying of these outstanding circumstances is the combined failure of the hand and air brake systems. Another of these circumstances surround the black boxes, which were retrieved intact, yet still have not been decoded.
It took more than four days for the mainstream media to report that the locomotives were found unscathed approximately one-half kilometre further up the track, where one of the two black boxes was retrieved intact the day following the tragedy. Montreal, Maine, and Atlantic Railway Inc. owner Ed Burkhardt claims representatives from his company were allowed to inspect the locomotives. He said the locomotives had their brakes set, as the engineer claimed, and that their wheels sustained significant damage as a result.
These details were not reported by the Quebec Transportation Safety Board although they did report the locomotives were found up-track unscathed and that black boxes were retrieved. One of the many questions that arise as a result is, how did the engines uncouple from the train travelling at speeds preliminary black box data indicate were as high as 101 kilometres an hour, and then after rolling 13 kilometres, come to a stop a mere 500 or so metres away from ground zero?
There are also questions in respect to the volatility of the crude carried, and how on earth it resulted in such destructive explosions which lit up Lac-Mégantic as bright as neighbouring cities seen from space. As recently as August 1 Transportation Safety Board head Ed Belkaloul was quoted saying, “We’ve heard from a number of experts who confirm that the crude oil acted in a way that was abnormal.”
Many reports, including this one from National Geographic, have stated that four tankers involved in the disaster were “pressurized.” Numerous other reports make the same claims, however, none of the publications are from within Canada despite the fact all out-of-country reports claim the CBC as the source of the report.
There also continues to be unconfirmed claims that four cars with pressurized propane in them were on the siding rail in Lac-Mégantic. Subsequent reports by CBC suggest that propane storage facilities in the area of the derailment were responsible for the huge explosions.
In recent days, however, officials reported they have sent materials recovered from the tank cars to test the constituents in order to derive what may have been in the them. Paper work exists, as is required, outlining the constituents of the crude oil contents originating from the Bakken fields. Crude oil is not normally pressurized when transported, therefore, it remains unclear what some of the cars may have contained to prompt such devastating explosions that destroyed almost 40 buildings while bursting fiery mushroom clouds hundreds of metres into the sky.
Analysis
Days after the tragedy, the editor of a local paper described it as a mini 9-11, and the Prime Minister proclaimed the site looked like a war zone. At about this time, the National Post commissioned a number of academics from universities around the country to establish the infographic upholding the already well established runaway narrative. As the single most detailed account of the disaster to date, the National Post continues to use the infographic.
Let’s focus on what the academics commissioned by the National Post depict as the course of events on that day according to the official runaway narrative, resulting from the Transportation Safety Board’s investigation.
This is the depiction of the steep grade the runaway train travelled, according to the infographic. Note that the National Post graph depicts a steady uninterrupted decline from Nantes to Lac-Mégantic, and a quick jump in speed at the onset (0-36 kms/hr), with a steady increasing speed only interrupted at one point where there’s a decrease in momentum and speed (13 kms/hr between the 4-7 km mark.)
The infographic includes the caveat that the “elevation is not to scale,” and we are about to learn why.
This next detailed graphic depiction, with topographic overlay, gives further information supporting the narrative of a steep grade steadily declining from point A to B, including the jump in speed at the onset, and the slowing at Laval-Nord, while also depicting the twists and turns between Nantes and Lac-Mégantic. Note the text boxes containing the description of events are written by the academic authors of the infographic (if you are unable to read the text in this graphic, view the original).
Next, let’s focus on the National Post map’s Estimated Start Point. The black circle (see the graphic below) is probably where the rear of the train was when tied down for the night. Note how the graph depicts an uninterrupted decline and that the train was estimated to be travelling 36 kms/hr at the 1 kilometre mark. The train, however, is 1.4 kilometres long — a point overlooked.
It’s inconceivable the train, which requires tremendous force to get rolling would have gained the speed depicted in the infographic so fast, moreover, the National Post published a report where the Transportation Safety Board stated “insufficient braking was applied,” which means some hand brakes were indeed applied (the engineer claims up to 11).
The train was tied down for the night on the main rail as another train occupied the siding. The purple line above depicts the precise position and length of the side rail as confirmed by different National Post infographic. The bottom most black line in the graphic above denotes precisely the position of the train according to both the National Post infographics, with the front of the train precisely at the bottom of the bowl grade where the black arrow is located. This means, according to the official runaway narrative, the train had rolled uphill from a standstill.
Included above is a reference to eight train cars (black circle) actually found in the Google Earth image. This was included for scale and the black line with arrow depicts the accurate length and placement of the train, as well as direction of travel. Note that even if the National Post infographic is wrong in its placement of the train (same place as depicted in the graph of the Google earth image), and the positioning of the train is shifted to any point along the side rail, it would still necessitate rolling up the steep incline — which equates to 20-plus metres over less than a 300 metre distance — from a standstill. This is known as a bowl track, and is used in the industry to ensure forces of gravity do not result in a runaway train.
When you consider this drastic upward grade, it is impossible to comprehend how the National Post infographic depicts the train moving from a standstill at all, let alone immediately reaching speeds of 36 kms/hr in the first kilometre. It simply defies the laws of physics for the train to roll uphill from a standstill.
Also, the train’s brakes were applied. This was confirmed by the Transportation Safety Board, therefore, it’s difficult to imagine how the train managed to start rolling under its own power with the brakes on uphill as is depicted in the graphic above.
Now let’s look at Laval-Nord, where the sharpest bend occurs. The infographic map depicts the train slowed down between the 4 kilometre and the 7 kilometre mark. According to Google Earth, however, this is where the steepest, straightest, and most steady decline of the entire journey exists.
The speed indicated on the graph’s red line declines from 72 kms/hr to 67 kms/hr, and finally to 59 kms/hr, and are positioned precisely, as the infographic depicts, at the 5, 6 and 7 kilometre marks.
It’s self-evident the train could not achieve this decline in momentum while travelling fully 20 metres downhill along a less than 3 kilometre stretch, however, given that the sharpest bend of the journey occurs at Laval-Nord, the train would have had to slow in order to negotiate the sharp curve and not derail.
If the train was indeed a free rolling runaway train, this bend occurs at the bottom of a steady declining grade 8 kilometres from the starting point, therefore, the speed would have peaked at this point and derailment would have likely occurred in Laval Nord, not Lac-Mégantic.
Two days after the tragic incident, reports surfaced that the black boxes were successfully retrieved, and Transportation Safety Board official Ed Belkaloul was quoted saying, “We have examined the locomotive, we have verified all the mechanisms on it, we recovered a copy of the famous black box.”
Oddly, two weeks later, at the same time the Transportation Safety Board released its two safety recommendations based on insufficient braking being applied, which CBC TV described as “pinpointing the cause of the disaster,” the Transporation Safety Board also included on their website this language:
Start decoding the content of the locomotive event recorder as well as the sense and braking unit (commonly known as the black boxes).
This despite comments by the lead investigators hours after the incident, and media reports, stating that the preliminary data from the locomotive’s black box indicate the train was travelling at 101 kms/hr, which the National Post infographic geared its speed and momentum calculations to reflect. This suggests the authors built the model to meet the preliminary data retrieved from the black box.
This of course gives rise to a number of questions. Why are they twisting the data to support the narrative? Why is there a discrepancy in how this is being reported?
First, we immediately had one preliminary data point released, then 10 days later the Transportation Safety Board is still just starting to decode the data while at the same time the CBC reports they have pinpointed the cause which resulted in the issuance of the two safety recommendations.
The Transportation Safety Board website report goes on to say in somewhat cryptic fashion:
We have the information from the locomotive event recorder and the sense and braking unit from the back of the train. We know in what position the controls were found following the accident.
As of August 1, the Transportation Safety Board has completed onsite work but continues to state, “Data from the locomotive event recorder — also known as a black box — will also be reviewed to validate speed and air brake reaction.” This suggest that four weeks after the tragedy, the review has not been completed and possibly not even started. This stands in stark contrast to the recent disaster in Spain where many black box details were promptly retrieved, decoded and reported.
It seems that any credible investigation would immediately retrieve (which they did) the black boxes and then decode the data (which they have not). Why the delay? Why were the black boxes sent to the United States then returned before the information was decoded and reported? Why is a narrative being established and the cause pinpointed when the data contained in the black boxes (one specifically for braking) has yet to be completely retrieved, decoded and reported on?
It would seem that the academics who constructed the National Post infographic did so in such a way as to have the data support the one single piece of preliminary data released from the black boxes (that the train reached a speed of 101kms/hr). This was done despite the overt errors presented above in order to explain how this tragedy occurred and why the train derailed with such intense fury.
It’s difficult to ascertain the details of the Transportation Safety Board’s proclamation that insufficient braking was applied because according to all reports, they are providing no further details. Once again, it’s not understood why they simply do not decode and disseminate the information contained in the sense and braking unit that was recovered intact after the tragic incident.
Last week when the Transportation Safety Board made the announcement, accompanied with the two safety recommendations, they declared that everyone was going to take a break for the first time since the incident, which calls into question the priorities as it relates to the handling of the black boxes. Many will recall that at the same time as the Lac-Mégantic disaster a plane crashed on the west coast in the United States, the black boxes were retrieved as the first order of business and the details reported within days.
Even without these details, however, there remains the fact that most modern locomotives similar to the ones involved in Lac-Mégantic have the Westinghouse Braking System, which is claimed as a fail safe:
“Under the Westinghouse system . . . brakes are applied by reducing train line pressure and released by increasing train line pressure. The Westinghouse system is thus fail safe — any failure in the train line, including a separation of the train, will cause a loss of train line pressure, causing the brakes to be applied and bringing the train to a stop, thus preventing a runaway train.”
Then there is the hand-brake system, which even if it was insufficient as declared by the Transportation Safety Board, the engineer is reported as saying he set no fewer than 11 car-specific hand brakes, as well as all five locomotives as confirmed by company representatives who were allowed to examine the locomotives. Presumably all of these details are in the sense and braking unit. As of August 1, the Transportation Safety Board reports it’s moving to a lab to “test conditions that resulted in the train moving.”
Summary of the graphical information
What the Google Earth graphics reveal and confirm:
The location of the tied down train includes an immediate and steep incline of 20 metres over less than 300 metres in distance — an impossible grade to travel from a standstill — no matter where the train was located along the side rail and regardless of the sufficiency of the applied braking system.
The decline in grade approaching Laval-Nord where the sharpest bend of the journey exists, dictates that the runaway train would have gained tremendous momentum and reached peak speeds, making that sharp bend the place where derailment would most likely occur.
What errors and oversight are contained in the National Post infographic:
The National Post infographic omits the immediate incline at Nantes, and instead depicts the quickest acceleration of speed over a single kilometre than anywhere else on the journey (0-36 kms/hr), despite the fact braking was indeed applied and the first bit of travel involved a short, steep incline.
The National Post infographic depicts the complete opposite of reality by showing the train slowing down over the longest, steepest and steadiest decline of the entire trek in order to negotiate the sharpest bend of the journey, meanwhile the actual topography of the land dictates precisely the opposite would occur resulting in what would have been peak speeds, making Laval-Nord the most likely location of derailment for a runaway train on this track over this terrain.
What the Google Earth data dictates:
According to the precise topography, in order for the train to begin rolling toward Lac-Mégantic from the staging ground in Nantes, power would have been required to start the train moving and pull it up the immediate inclining grade.
Braking would have been applied in order for the train to slow enough before Laval-Nord, as depicted in the infographic, to avoid derailing at the sharp bend prevalent at the bottom of the long decline, 8 kilometres into the journey from Nantes. The industry standard to avoid derailment for such curves in the track is to not exceed 80 kms/hr. This also explains the National Post depiction not exceeding 80 kms/hr at this point, yet inexplicably reaching the 101 kms/hr mark over the last few kilometres as dictated by the one data point released from the black boxes.
An abandoned tanker carrying jet fuel for forestry helicopters battling summer fires lays overturned, leaking 33,000 litres of toxic fuel into the Slocan Valley’s Lemon Creek
by Nelle Maxey
It was a beautiful day.
The day was Friday July 26. It was just like any other sunny summer day in the Slocan Valley, located in the West Kootenay region of British Columbia 650 kilometres east of Vancouver.
It was the height of the tourist season. Bed and breakfasts, restaurants, and retail stores were swollen with visitors. Kayaks, canoes, rafts and tubes filled the Slocan River as swimmers cooled themselves at public and private beaches along the river. Others were in their gardens, assessing if the beans were ready for canning and the garlic ready for digging. People picked raspberries and blueberries from the loaded bushes, dug potatoes, plucked zucchini, and lettuce for dinner. It was a bumper year for gardens in the valley. Farmers were in their fields cutting hay. Market gardeners and local greenhouses irrigated their crops and picked produce to sell.
All this of course was normal. What wasn’t normal, however, was the drone of helicopters flying over the Slocan Valley’s Winlaw area, dumping water scooped from the river on the two-day old Perry Ridge fire.
Then disaster struck the Slocan Valley.
At about 1:30 p.m., a large tanker truck delivering jet fuel for the Ministry of Forests fire-fighting helicopters tumbled into Lemon Creek and dumped 33,000 litres of jet fuel into the swift-flowing creek which joins the Slocan River downstream of the spill.
The driver was on the wrong road. If the driver was on the right road, they would have used Uris Road north of the Lemon Creek bridge. The tanker was on Lemon Creek Road south of the bridge. This stretch of road is a narrow, decommissioned logging road that had been closed to traffic due to slides and crumbling banks.
In the official record of what happen, one report says the driver was to meet forestry personnel who would direct them to the helicopter staging area. This never happened. Instead, the driver proceeded on his own up Lemon Creek Road, past two signs that indicated the road was closed. The driver eventually found a place to turn around and was on his way back down to Highway 6 when a road bank gave way under the weight of the tanker.
The driver, not seriously injured after the accident, scrambled up the 15-foot bank and walked the 6 kilometres back to Highway 6 where a passing vehicle picked him up so he could report the accident. RCMP arrived on the scene at approximately 3:30 p.m. in the afternoon, although the fumes were so bad they could not approach the area. Once it was confirmed the truck was carrying jet fuel, the Interior Health Authority was notified at 6 p.m. on Friday evening. A few hours later, the first evacuation order was issued for 800 residents within 300 meters of Lemon Creek and the Slocan River for 3 kilometres upstream and downstream of the spill. It took many hours before the volunteer firemen and search and rescue teams could be organized to notify residents of the evacuation order. The first phone calls went out around midnight with volunteers going door-to-door in the most affected areas.
Meanwhile back at the spill site, officials estimate the tanker released the 33,000 litres of fuel in about 40 minutes. The fuel slick reached the Winlaw Bridge sometime around 6 p.m. (about the same time the local health authority was notified of the accident). Children swimming in the river near Appledale just north of Winlaw were later reported to have skin rashes. People who were canoeing in the area also reported health effects. Residents along the river between Winlaw and Lemon Creek reported that the smell was so strong by 5 p.m. that they closed up their homes and left the area. Within 24 hours of the accident the slick had traveled 60 kilometres: down the Slocan River, then into the Kootenay River to just above of the Brilliant Hydroelectric Dam at Castlegar. The first boom to stop the slick was established there on Saturday afternoon.
The plume was 2 to 3 kilometres long and 30 to 50 metres wide. A Ministry of Environment spokesperson said a boom was put in place at about 1:30 p.m. on Saturday just above the Brilliant Dam. The spokesperson said the boom’s effectiveness in containing the fuel was being monitored. Officials didn’t know at this time if fuel had entered the dam works.
The evacuation
Within hours of the first evacuation notice issued by the Interior Health Authority, the evacuation was expanded to include everyone in the valley. Anyone living within a 3 kilometre radius of the river between Lemon Creek and Playmore Junction (where Hwy 6 joins Hwy 3 to Nelson and Castlegar) were to evacuate. This affected 2,500 residences. As the fuel progressed down the river, health authorities had become worried sleeping people would not smell the fuel.
People with emergency services and volunteer fire departments began making phone calls and knocking on doors. The evacuation order included a “Do Not Use Water” order to “all users of water supplies within 10 kilometers downstream of the spill.” Later, the wording of the order changed to suggest water wells were okay to use. This was revised again to say shallow wells near the river might be affected. Today, a week after the accident the order explains that if your creek surface water or well water doesn’t smell like jet fuel, then it’s okay to use. Essentially, a smell test was the only test for private water supplies that didn’t originate from the rivers or Lemon Creek. The evacuation order also contained the following statement: “Jet fuel poses an immediate health risk to people. Exposure can burn skin, inhalation can harm respiratory systems and may cause brain damage. It is also dangerous to consume.”
The boundaries of the evacuation and a timeline of events are shown below:
Fifty volunteer fire fighters from the four valley fire departments worked overnight and into Saturday to notify residents of the evacuation. Even though they had help, they concentrated on people closest to the river and spill site. They notified over 800 residents in all. Much of the notification went by word of mouth to neighbours, family and friends, all of which took place at night. Many residents in the north end of the valley left even before the order was issued due to the heavy concentration of fumes.
By noon on Saturday, the fumes had dissipated enough to lift the evacuation order. Residents trickled back into the valley all day Saturday. Unfortunately, at the north end of the valley some people returned to homes that were saturated with the smell of fuel. Even people’s gardens and hay fields were contaminated, not to mention the watering tanks for livestock had a layer of fuel on top of the water.
By this time, people in the valley settled down and most residents assumed the scare was over. Then the town hall meeting was held.
Many questions, few answers
On July 30, hundreds of residents from all areas of the valley jammed Winlaw Hall for a meeting to hear presentations from local government officials, provincial authorities and employees from the company involved. The meeting was not well organized. The handouts did not contain contact information or the names of the speakers. At first, many residents did not have their questions answered as they were told they were not on topic. Then the format was changed and residents were allowed to ask questions of any panellist. Many questions required responses from multiple panellists.
The health official immediately declared the serious nature of this event and explained the reasons for the evacuation. Though benzene was not a component of the jet fuel spilled in the creek, kerosene was a component and is dangerous by skin contact or ingestion. This applies to humans and animals. Aquatic life is at special risk as the specific type of fuel spilled (Jet Fuel A1) is listed to have a chronic toxic effect on aquatic ecosystems.
Residents were informed the “Do Not Use Water” order would stay in effect for 5 to 10 days at a minimum. The order applied to recreation in the river as well as water use from the river and Lemon Creek. All such water systems should be shut down so the contaminated water is not drawn into pipes and hot water heaters. Other surface water users from the creeks not affected directly should use their own judgement and apply the “smell test” to their water. Deep wells were unlikely to be affected. Shallow wells along the river should not be used as they may be contaminated.
This was the first time some residents heard the information about shallow wells and surface creeks. Individual water licence holders or well owners would not receive assistance to have their water tested. Registered purveyors on water systems with more than two users could receive assistance to have water testing done. Residents were also told to wash all vegetables 3 times for 3 minutes before use with potable water (a Catch-22 for residents without potable water supplies), and were also told not to buy local produce.
As residents poured into the line-up for the mic and began asking questions and sharing their stories, the consequences of the spill and the fact that little help had been available were becoming more apparent. The problems associated with the spill were most severe at the north end of the valley, from Lemon Creek to Winlaw. Homes were contaminated with the fuel smell. Fruit trees and vegetables were contaminated. Hay fields and pastures were contaminated. No water was available for livestock, poultry or gardens.
Many people were without any water for drinking, washing dishes, flushing toilets or showering. Similar water problems prevailed all along the river to the lower valley – especially contaminated hay and pastures, no water for gardens and livestock, as well as difficulty hauling enough water from potable water tank stations for resident needs. The meeting was held five days after the spill and potable water tanks had been set up in four locations in the valley only on the day of the meeting.
As of Saturday, August 3, the water and the rocks in Lemon Creek still smelled of jet fuel. There was a sheen visible and emulsion (milky-looking jet fuel and water mix) under rocks in the creek at the Lemon Creek bridge on Highway 6. The road has been remediated just before the accident site where fuel spilled from the tanker. There is no fuel on the road at the actual location where the truck went off. There is water from seeps in the rock face running across the road at that location. You can see this water in published photographs. Workers at the site agreed that the water run-off contributed to weakening the bank that collapsed under the truc, resulting in the fuel spill.
Recent developments:
Until further notice, a “Do Not Use” order for drinking water and recreational use remains in effect for Lemon Creek, Slocan River and Kootenay River above and below Brilliant Dam. Fuel is still visible in the containment booms and along the shoreline.
Garden vegetables, fruit, eggs, and dairy milk that were contacted by the fuel vapor are SAFE to consume as long as they do not smell like fuel or have a fuel sheen. Interior Health is advising residents to thoroughly wash fruit and vegetables with alternate water sources to remove any dirt and debris prior to consumption. Food products that have been irrigated with contaminated water AND smell like fuel should be discarded.
Aproximately 1,000 litres of contaminated material has been recovered.
RCMP have issued Vessel Operating Restrictions for the Slocan River from Lemon Creek to the Kootenay River, which will be lifted when the clean-up has been completed.
The smell of jet fuel is still apparent in the Lemon Creek area and responders equipped with gas monitors have been testing the air quality outside residences close to the spill site.
Many residents in the valley are still waiting for promised testing.
A Resiliency Centre is being established at the Winlaw Elementary School to support residents with shower, lavatory and emergency support services. It is expected to open within the next couple of days.
Polaris Applied Sciences from Kirkland, Washington was hired to conduct a Shoreline Clean-up and Assessment Technique, or SCAT. Leading the SCAT team is Polaris principal, Dr. Elliott Taylor, a world-renowned expert in spill clean-up operations. The assessment is underway and is already providing additional information which is helping to clean up the waterways by providing operational focus to the response teams and prioritizing where we focus our attention.
Light “flushing” activities are being conducted to free product (Jet Fuel A1 / without additives) from stream banks and vegetation to make it available for collection. Nearly 1,000 metres of containment boom has been deployed throughout the Slocan River system and it is capturing any free-flowing product. The product is being skimmed off the water into a vacuum truck and removed to a licensed waste facility. In areas where soil is impacted, the soil is being removed and trucked to a separate licensed waste facility. A significant amount of contaminated water and soil was recovered.
Experts continue to collect water samples, sediment samples, and fish and wildlife from the impacted water courses. Wildlife mortalities to date have been collected and sent to the laboratory for analysis.
Water quality test results are being sent to the Interior Health Authority to assist in making a decision on when the “Do Not Use Water” order may be lifted.
Responders equipped with gas monitors have been testing the air quality throughout the area of potential and observed influence. To date, atmospheric concentrations have been within established government standards; however, the smell of jet fuel is still occasionally apparent.
Nelle Maxey is a grandmother who lives in the beautiful Slocan Valley in south-eastern BC. She believes it is her obligation as a citizen to concern herself with the policies and politics of government at the federal, provincial and local level.
With so many Canadians eagerly awaiting the end of the anti-democratic, unaccountable Harper regime, some seem to be inclined to support any alternative that may stand a chance for replacing the Cons in 2015, after the next federal election. But maybe we should take a pause to think this through just a little more. Canadian Idol Trudeau, though he hasn’t said that much so far, has already shown that he shares many of the policy positions of Harper. This is where things get scary.
With Duffy, Wallin, Wright and Harb making the news, it might seem that now is a good time to call attention to Trudeau not believing in a need for changing the Senate status quo. For Trudeau, it’s just a matter of choosing good Senators – that is to say, the Senate would be improved if Trudeau got to choose Liberal senators instead of Harper choosing Conservative ones. But these are merely small distractions from the frightening resemblances between Trudeau and Harper.
Indeed, there are extraordinary similarities between Harper and Trudeau on:
The Middle Class, Corporate Taxes, Health Care and Trade with China
Justin Trudeau claims to be a champion of the middle class. Sound good so far?
Well, never before in the history of Canada have inequalities between Canadians been more pronounced. Thanks to the corporate tax cuts initiated by the Liberals and accelerated by the Conservatives, those with power and money – especially the petroleum industry and the banks – are sitting on $600 billion in liquidity. The Conservatives tell us we must tighten our belts, that young people have to accept low wages and precarious jobs. Meanwhile, our cities are clogged for lack of investment in sustainable transit alternatives, etc., because the Conservatives tell us the cupboard is bare.
Yet, Justin Trudeau, self-proclaimed champion of the middle class, has said he will not raise corporate taxes. When push comes to shove, Liberals like Conservatives, always seem to cede to money and power.
Justin Trudeau thinks there are no money problems associated with health care, just management challenges. This position is necessary because Trudeau would lead a government short of revenues, thanks to the lowest corporate taxes among G8 nations! Conservatives couldn’t agree more. The Cons plan on cutting health care funding within 3 years. So much for caring about the middle class!
But there is much more middle class stuff that makes the celebrity Prince Trudeau a scary prospect. A case in point is Justin Trudeau favoured the sale of Nexen to state-controlled Chinese interests because he said it would pave the way to free trade with China, which would in turn pave the way to more prosperity for the middle class. The Conservatives have said the same thing. Yet the North American Free Trade Agreement has been around for a long time and middle class revenues/wages are stagnating or going down. The middle class is being hollowed out. The required fixes are internal/domestic.
Regarding the aforementioned, proposed Canada-China trade agreement, in response to massive dumping on global markets by China’s clean tech industry, the US has imposed trade tariffs running from 31% to 250% on solar tech imports from China, along with tariffs of 45% to 71% on imports of Chinese wind turbine towers; 2) the European Commission is considering tariffs averaging 47% on solar tech imports for China; and 3) Canada is the only country dumb enough to accept, under the proposed China-Canada agreement, a guaranteed exemption for environmental technologies from commercial barriers.
Guns: an integral part of Canadian culture
Justin Trudeau thinks that guns are an integral part of Canadian culture and that the gun registry was ineffective. Stephen Harper has similar views. This, despite the fact that the Canadian Association of Police Chiefs supported the gun registry as: 1) an effective tool for police in the line of duty; 2) regarding the development of evidence related to judicial proceedings.
Environment, submission to the fossil fuel Lobby, Tar Sands, Kinder Morgan and Keystone
Then there’s the matter of the environment. Trudeau and Harper say they favour sustainable development but the legacies of both of their parties suggest otherwise. Prior to their defeat, the Liberals had several climate change action plans. They all failed to do the job, because when you got down to the details, their plans were concessions to money and power. Jean Chrétien promised the petroleum industry that, in the event of a price on carbon, there would be a very affordable ceiling on the price of carbon. Stéphane Dion came out with his billions for a Climate Fund just before the Martin government was defeated, a fund that would have the government pay the largest emitters to reduce their respective emissions or invest in carbon offsets. In other words, the more one emits, the more the government would subsidize – a pay-the-polluter principle rather than the polluter pays. No wonder Canada’s emission levels spiked upwards during the Liberal reign!
Thanks to Conservatives’ narrow focus on accommodating the fossil fuel lobby, Canada is one of the rare developed nations that is not a full participant in one of the greatest job creation areas of our time, the clean tech sectors. China had 1.6 million jobs, and Germany 372,000 jobs in clean tech sectors in 2011. Today, there are over 500 wind tech manufacturing facilities in the US; wind energy was the largest source of new electrical power generation in the US in 2012; the US solar sector employed 119,000 Americans in 2012; and 20% of US venture capital activity in 2011 and 2012 went towards the US clean tech sectors. Yet Canada is barely participating in green economy and, the few advancements that are being made, are thanks to provincial policies
What can we expect from Trudeau on environmental matters? Don’t get your hopes up. Justin Trudeau has already ceded to power and money by being very vague on environmental matters so as not to offend anyone. Following the Jean Chrétien model, Boy King Trudeau supports the Keystone pipeline and the expansion of the Kinder Morgan pipeline to Vancouver (to export tar sands oil to Asia), while saying he is a champion of the environment – even though the emissions associated with tar sands-related production for these pipelines would negate any of the Trudeau’s nebulous motherhood notions of being on the side of the environment.
Poor Sense of Priorities: Pot Over the Lac-Mégantic Tragedy
More recently, Trudeau has shown his true colours on priorities, with the July 2013 refusal of both the Conservatives and Liberals to interrupt their summer break for the purpose of holding sessions of the Parliamentary committee on Transport to look into the Lac-Mégantic rail disaster that left an estimated 47 people dead. One doesn’t need to await the report of the Transportation Safety Board to figure out that the Transport Canada approval of the Montreal Maine and Atlantic Railway request to have only one person operate a train with 72 wagons of dangerous cargo was a stupid decision.
Former Transport Canada employees have said that, under the Harper regime, safety has taken a back seat to corporate profits. The odds of the tragedy ever happening with 2 people in charge of the train would have been very minimal. But Trudeau thinks the top message for the lazy, hazy days of summer is about legalizing pot. Glad to see he has got his priorities right.
Employment insurance
It was the Liberals who started gutting Employment Insurance and the Conservatives have merely followed through. Justin Trudeau must be counting on the short memory of Canadians.
Wrap-up
Wrapping up, juggling complex issues such as taxation fairness, equal opportunity and participation in the global migration to a green economy, health care, day care etc., requires well-thought-out, synergistic policies with real depth. But both Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau prefer to operate in sound bites and clichés on such matters. Harper answers all tough questions with, “but it’s the economy.” As for Trudeau, he simply repeats his aforementioned mantra that he is for the middle class without any references as to what he would do now that income inequalities have reached an historic high and corporate tax revenues aren’t sufficient to do anything meaningful for the middle class.
Unfortunately, you won’t see much of the above-mentioned criticisms in the media. With very few exceptions, journalists are not interested in the policy details or comparative analyses. The majority of English newspapers in Canada are partisan and represent, first and foremost, corporate Canada, money and power. Canadians have been criticized by some journalists for falling for a superficial Justin Trudeau brand, but the reasons for this can, in part, be found in the lack of depth by the journalists making such criticisms.
Once again, the Liberals are presenting themselves as the best option to address their own poor legacy.
With Trudeau at the helm, Canada now has two Conservative parties.
There is a robust debate happening in university halls, around religious congregations, and at individual kitchen tables nationwide. The driving question: Should we divest from the fossil fuel industry?
Whether you are a college student, a trustee of a religious or educational institution, or an individual with a retirement fund, this is a relevant question for you.
Earlier this year, several community organizations in Boston, including the Institute for Policy Studies’ Jamaica Plain Forum, held a community forum in Boston to discuss the moral and practical issues of divesting from fossil fuel companies as a strategy to combat climate change.
The forum, viewable here, brought together those with expertise in finance, community organizing, social justice, and policy to address questions surrounding the basic nature of fossil fuel divestment as well as its implications for our investments and our world. Some of the questions we debated were: Is divestment meaningful? Can we exert leverage over energy companies by retaining the leverage of ownership? Would divestment reduce the investment returns required to sustain our institutions and income needs?
Our view is that our current economy, based on insatiable extraction and consumption, is simply unsustainable – for the planet as well as for us. Powerful fossil fuel corporations exercise an undue influence on environmental and economic policy, thwarting our ability to adopt sane and far-sighted energy policies. Here’s what we found:
1. We Did the Climate Change Math: Now We Must Act
We must compel the 200 largest fossil fuel corporations to keep 80% of their carbon assets “in the ground.” Extracting and burning these reserves of oil, coal and gas would raise the earth’s temperature over 2 degrees centigrade, unleashing climate catastrophe. [Read: Rolling Stone, Bill McKibben, “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math”]
2. Time to Choose Sides: We Must Raise the Cost of Extracting and Burning Carbon
If we succeed in averting climate catastrophe, it will be because we have succeeded in raising the cost of fossil fuels and forcing the industry to internalize its real costs to society and the environment. This will lower the profitability of the sector – and lower returns for investors. Our cities, congregations, and universities should not be in a position where we are rooting for the fossil fuel industry to win. It isn’t right that the value of a sector doesn’t reflect its impact on the earth and society. In the long-term, destroying the planet doesn’t help us boost our investment returns.
3. We Are All Responsible for Carbon Pollution, But the Fossil Fuel Industry Has a Disproportionate Responsibility for Climate Change
While each of us should take personal responsibility for reducing our individual carbon usage, the fossil fuel industry has disproportionate responsibility for climate change. Many of us would like to have lower carbon lifestyles, but we’re systemically blocked from doing so via the lobbying power of the fossil fuel industry. The fossil fuel industry uses their considerable financial and political power to rig the rules to block regulation, block sane energy policy, extract taxpayer subsidies, thwart renewables, and limit consumer choice. They are writing government policies and fundamentally distorting our democracy. The industry is institutionally caught in a short-term system, where their economic interests are aligned with destroying the planet. If we had a carbon tax, innovation and development would be pushed towards energy efficiency. [See: Oil Change International’s Dirty Energy Money index.]
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4. Fossil Fuel Profitability is Based on Rigging Our Political Systems
The profitability of the fossil fuel sector is based on their ability to politically influence and rig the system and shift the real costs associated with their industry onto society. The externalities that they shift include: environmental pollution, worker health and safety, cost of military deployment in oil-producing regions, negative health impacts, global climate change, and political corruption. If fossil fuel companies had to absorb the true costs of these externalities, the industry would be transformed—and would probably likely focus first on energy conservation and sustainable energy sourcing before further extraction. Their dependence on political rules makes them a risky and volatile sector as investments. When their political clout diminishes, as we hope it will, they will become less profitable. [See: Oil Change International]
5. Investment Returns in Fossil Fuels Will Inevitably Decline
Over the last 20 years, the fossil fuel energy sector has been among the most profitable of all sectors. For a variety of reasons, including those described above, this will not remain true. As policy makers start pushing back, they will eliminate government subsidies for fossil fuel, as President Obama has proposed. They will pass laws requiring fossil fuel producers to be more responsible for their negative environmental and social impacts. There is also growing evidence that the assets of fossil fuel industries are greatly over-valued. And, if we are successful, many fossil fuel companies will have “stranded assets,” reserves that will not be tapped. When the real value of carbon holdings is adjusted downward, billions in shareholder wealth will evaporate. [See: Carbon Tracker]
6. Divesting from Fossil Fuels Will Not Negatively Impact Return
Investors are understandably concerned that their investments will earn less money if they eliminate profitable fossil fuel corporations. It may not be prudent to sell off securities with large capital gains all at once; individuals and investors should get professional advice on the best divestment strategy. Some institutions have long-term relationships with trusted investment advisors who have helped their investments grown. It is not ungrateful or unprofessional to direct these advisors to gradually divest from dirty energy and reinvest in socially responsible alternatives. Beware, however, of advisors who tell you it can’t be done or predict huge losses overtime.
It is conventional investment wisdom that if you narrow the breadth of your investments—and fossil fuel securities are approximately 10 percent of the public equities market—that you increase risk. But there is plenty of expertise in the “socially responsible investment” field as to how to divest and design an investment portfolio that will still earn comparable returns. Industry professionals are working now to design “fossil fuel free” investment portfolios and mutual funds.
7. The Fossil Fuel Sector Will Not Reform Itself
The fossil fuel industry will only reform when we change the rules that shape their marketplace and operations. This can be accomplished through regulation and taxation. Instituting a robust carbon tax, phased in over several years and with offsets to address its regressivity, would signal huge market shifts. Many thoughtful people believe we should stay invested in fossil fuel corporations to have leverage with them and engage with them. This has not worked.
8. Support the Movement and an ‘Outside Strategy’
Selling stocks in fossil fuel companies may not drive down stock prices or even devalue the industry since other buyers will purchase those stocks. Regardless, the goal of the dirty energy divestment fight is to change public dialogue and society’s lifestyle, not stock prices. A traditional approach has been inside: engaging with the company and using our ownership stake to press the company to reform. This hasn’t worked. To send a strong message, we need to sever our ties to this sector and make these companies moral pariahs, similar to how the public treated tobacco companies.
Thankfully, there is a radical edge emerging to avert climate catastrophe. The “inside” strategy of working with the fossil fuel industry to reform itself is not moving fast enough. The new “outside strategy” activists are calling out the historic environmental groups who have compromised themselves into irrelevance. They are calling out Wall Street—those interested in only their own private gain at the expense of society and the earth. They are upping the ante in terms of direct action, civil disobedience along with traditional organizing and electoral politics. The call for divestment is part of this movement. [See: 350.org]
9. Engaged Shareholder: You Can Still Work the “Inside Strategy” If You Want
Some institutional investors argue that they can change the behavior of the fossil fuel industry by retaining ownership of corporate shares and being engaged investors. Institutions or individuals that want to actively engage in shareholder activism—introducing social issue resolutions— should retain the $2,000 of stock that enables them to introduce resolutions, as Greenpeace and the Institute for Policy Studies do. Ownership is only one source of leverage, however. We should engage as full stakeholders—citizens, employees, consumers, communities, and moral actors.
10. The Moral Question Is Why Should Any Institution or Individual Stay Invested: This Is an Abolitionist Cause
Divestment is not primarily simply an economic strategy, but also a moral and political one. If slavery is wrong, is it wrong to make a profit from it? If Apartheid is wrong, is it wrong to make a profit from it? “If it is wrong to wreck the planet, then it is wrong to profit from it.” [See: The Boston Phoenix, Wen Stephenson, “The New Abolitionists”]
11. We Can Divest from Fossil Fuels and Invest in the New Economy
The next 20 years will be unlike the last 50 years. We are entering a stage of discontinuity thanks to ecological and economic change. We are in a transition to a new economy—based on an entirely different set of assumptions about energy and the future source of livelihoods. We need to shift capital investment away from the dinosaur economy and towards the sustainable and just new economy. Compared to the limited, risky, corrupt and unethical fossil fuel sector, there is a wide range of socially responsible investment opportunities with comparable returns for individuals, religious institutions, and other institutions. [See: New Economy Working Group]
Conclusion: We Should Divest from Fossil Fuels and Invest in the New Economy
There is no good reason why we should remain invested in the fossil fuel industries, not when we can continue to powerfully advocate with corporations and maintain sufficient returns. We can and should find ways to shift our investment capital to the socially and environmentally attuned institutions and enterprises of the new economy.
Like smokers who put off quitting until their health starts to suffer, we’re learning what happens when bad habits catch up with us. We’re witnessing the terrible effects of fossil fuel addiction every day: frequent, intense storms and floods, extended droughts, rapidly melting Arctic ice, disappearing glaciers, deadly smog and pollution, contaminated waterways and destroyed habitats. Transport accidents are also increasing as governments and industry scramble to get fuels out of the ground and to market as quickly as possible.
Throughout it all, we’re asking the wrong questions. Take the recent horrific disaster in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec. A train carrying fracked crude oil from North Dakota to a refinery in Saint John, New Brunswick, derailed, caught fire and caused explosions that destroyed much of the town and killed dozens of people, sending millions of litres of oil into the ground, air, sewers and Chaudière River. It’s a senseless tragedy that has everyone in Canada and beyond grieving for the community’s citizens and their families.
Governments and the railway company must answer numerous questions about safety regulations and practices, to prevent a similar catastrophe from ever occurring. The larger questions, though, are about the dramatic increases in fossil fuel use and transport. Sadly, industry proponents quickly exploited the situation to argue for expanding pipelines.
As growing human populations and increasing industrialization drive up the worldwide demand for fossil fuels, and as oil, gas and coal companies rush to extract, sell and burn as much as possible while markets remain strong, we’re seeing ever-increasing exploitation from difficult sources – fracking, oil sands, deepsea drilling and more.
The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers expects oil production in Western Canada to double from three-million barrels a day to more than six-million by 2030. This means a huge increase in the amount of fuels transported around the country and the world in pipelines, rail cars, trucks and ocean tankers. According to the Railway Association of Canada, rail shipment of oil has already increased dramatically in Canada, from 500 carloads in 2009 to 140,000 this year.
It’s true that rail accidents can be more devastating to human life than pipeline accidents – although when it comes to oil, pipeline breaks usually spill greater quantities and cause more environmental damage than train derailments. But shipping massive volumes of oil and gas is unsafe by either method. As we transport ever-increasing volumes of fossil fuels over greater distances to broader networks, we can expect more spills and accidents. Wastefully and rapidly burning them is also driving climate change, which experts say may even affect rail safety, as extreme heat and sudden temperature shifts can cause rails to buckle, increasing the potential for derailments.
Massive pipeline spills and devastating rail accidents are among the immediate and frightening consequences of our growing appetite for fossil fuels, but our bad habits are really starting to hit back with climate change. The homes and lives lost around the world, numerous plant and animal species facing extinction, rising health-care costs from pollution-related illness and massive clean-up efforts after flooding show that failing to address climate change is far more costly than doing something about it. Much of what we’re seeing now – from increased intense rainfall and flooding in some parts of the world to extended droughts in others – is what climate scientists have been predicting for decades.
We’re not going to stop using oil overnight, and we will continue to transport it, so we must improve standards and regulations for pipelines, rail, trucks and tankers. This should include safer rail cars for moving dangerous goods. Also, many environmental groups are calling for “a comprehensive, independent safety review of all hydrocarbon transportation – pipelines, rail, tanker and truck.” But in the long run, we have to find ways to slow down. By conserving energy and switching to cleaner sources, we can start to move away from fossil fuels – and to use remaining reserves less wastefully.
That’s the discussion we need to have, rather then getting mired in debates about transport methods. As energy writer Russ Blinch noted in a Huffington Post article, “Looking at pipelines versus rail tankers is really like asking, ‘Should I drive the car with bad brakes or the one with bad tires?’”
We need to look at the big picture.
Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Communications Manager Ian Hanington.
By electing a party whose principal economic platform is the development of British Columbia’s natural gas resources, BC voters have decided to tempt disaster. The province’s premier, apparently oblivious to the portentous warnings of climate science, has created a new ministry specifically tasked with the responsibility of developing at least three Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) plants by 2020 — the industry envisions an eventual total of six — with the objective of shipping massive quantities of this product to an apparently energy-hungry Asian market.
The strategy is couched in exuberant promise. Billions of dollars in royalties are expected to quickly erase BC’s debt, provide employment for thousands, end homelessness, fund education, solve healthcare problems and create a huge legacy fund. An estimated trillion dollars in additional economic activity over 30 years is supposed to bring unparalleled wealth to the province. In response to environmental concerns, LNG is being pitched as a “climate solution” because burning natural gas is advertised as producing only about half the carbon dioxide of oil. Everyone is supposed to relax, trust that the future will be secure under the guidance of political expedience, and disregard the frenzy of drilling, fracking and pumping.
However, such promise comes with concerns. Global carbon dioxide emissions continue to rocket upward, with no reductions in sight. World consumption of coal is soaring, increasing in almost every country but the United States. Japan, stung by the trauma of the meltdown of its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, is shifting its energy toward coal and gas — its carbon dioxide emissions are up 30 percent. Even Germany, with its idealistic pragmatism on carbon emissions, is building more coal-fired electrical generation stations as it, too, cuts back on nuclear power. Meanwhile, the promise of making coal clean with carbon capture and storage has been mostly ineffectual, both economically and practically. To complete the scenario, huge new supplies of oil are now rushing to market from the innovation of horizontal drilling in shale deposits. The International Energy Agency has measured the daily global consumption of oil at 89.8 million barrels per day for 2012, and expects a rise to 90.6 mbd for 2013. So LNG will be added to the climate-changing effects of unrestrained oil and coal consumption.
With no foreseeable shortages of fossil fuels for decades, and with the prospect of nearly limitless quantities of natural gas inundating the market by pipeline and LNG tankers, economists are predicting a decrease in the dollar value of oil and coal. This will encourage their use, reduce the pressure for efficiency, and undermine the renewable energy option from such sources such as wind, solar, geothermal and tidal — precisely what the global climate crisis does not need.
Assuming that the foundational principles of climate science are correct — as they almost certainly are — then the development of natural gas and LNG in BC is a regressive strategy, a shortsighted and reckless venture in the direction of catastrophe. When burning 1 kg of natural gas produces 2.75 kg of carbon dioxide, advertising LNG as “green” is a political strategy, not an environmental one.
Considerable evidence argues against the environmental benefits of LNG — cleaner than oil and coal is hardly a sterling recommendation for burning another fossil fuel. Extracting reliable quantities of natural gas from sparse concentrations in shale requires nearly constant drilling. Fracking necessitates the injection of toxic chemicals and inordinate amounts of valuable water into sometimes unpredictable strata. Leakage of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, commonly occurs in the process. Pumping adds to emissions. The cooling and compressing to convert natural gas to LNG is extremely energy intensive. Then ocean-going shipping contributes to the inefficiency. By totalling all these expenditures of energy, some critics calculate that LNG is almost as carbon intensive as coal.
Furthermore, the economic benefits for BC are likely overly optimistic. Many countries are presently planning or building LNG plants for export purposes — a dozen in the US and several in Australia. And Russia, with natural gas resources that dwarf the ones in this province, will be piping supplies directly to China. Meanwhile, Asian countries are being careful to diversify their LNG sources, a strategy designed to keep the energy market competitive and prices down.
But the sociological argument against LNG is, perhaps, the most damning and compelling. Societies that come to rely heavily on the export of raw resources invariably stultify their human potential and handicap their future prospects. Their economies become narrow, brittle and unstable, subject to the vagaries of boom-and-bust cycles. Skewed in favour of fast and easy money rather than solid and sustainable enterprise, they relinquish their economic control to the decisions of others. When the source of their wealth is fragile and uncertain, their aspirations invariably overreach their ability to pay and their collective psychology begins to exhibit the personality characteristics of the addict.
Such resource-based societies lose resilience, independence and confidence. So they are inclined to perceive themselves as vulnerable victims rather than confident initiators. As their collective psyche suffers an erosion of power, sophistication, pride and morale, they become cynical, an unhealthy psychology that combines with a frayed social fabric to make their problems progressively more difficult to solve. A sense of defeat and powerlessness even manifests as a declining involvement in participatory democracy.
British Columbians will pay a high price for LNG. But the cost to the global environment will be immeasurably higher. BC owes itself and the world much more than this.
