http://www.envinews.eu/article/622863/
Published: Thursday, March 28, 2013

The newly elected government in Greenland has halted approval of new offshore oil and gas drilling permits in its Arctic waters.

Prime Minister Aleqa Hammond said that he was reluctant to approve new permits and that existing operations would be subject to more scrutiny moving forward. He also will set up a parliamentary body to examine offshore operations.

Oil companies view Greenland, Russia and Alaska as containing roughly 25 percent of the world’s remaining oil and gas reserves.

But environmentalists continue to voice concerns about drilling in those areas and its effects on climate change and the pristine northern environment.

“Until now, the people of Greenland have been kept in the dark about the enormous risks taken by the politicians and companies in the search for Arctic oil. Now it seems that the new government will start taking these risks seriously. The logical conclusion must be a total ban on offshore oil drilling in Greenland,” said Jon Burgwald, an Arctic campaigner for Greenpeace in Denmark.

(Terry Macalister, London Guardian, March 27). — MM

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/01/opinion/the-tar-sands-disaster.htm

Published: March 31, 2013

WATERLOO, Ontario

IF President Obama blocks the Keystone XL pipeline once and for all, he’ll do Canada a favor.

Canada’s tar sands formations, landlocked in northern Alberta, are a giant reserve of carbon-saturated energy – a mixture of sand, clay and a viscous low-grade petroleum called bitumen. Pipelines are the best way to get this resource to market, but existing pipelines to the United States are almost full. So tar sands companies, and the Alberta and Canadian governments, are desperately searching for export routes via new pipelines.
Canadians don’t universally support construction of the pipeline. A poll by Nanos Research in February 2012 found that nearly 42 percent of Canadians were opposed.

Many of us, in fact, want to see the tar sands industry wound down and eventually stopped, even though it pumps tens of billions of dollars annually into our economy.
The most obvious reason is that tar sands production is one of the world’s most environmentally damaging activities. It wrecks vast areas of boreal forest through surface mining and subsurface production. It sucks up huge quantities of water from local rivers, turns it into toxic waste and dumps the contaminated water into tailing ponds that now cover nearly 70 square miles.

Also, bitumen is junk energy. A joule, or unit of energy, invested in extracting and processing bitumen returns only four to six joules in the form of crude oil. In contrast, conventional oil production in North America returns about 15 joules. Because almost all of the input energy in tar sands production comes from fossil fuels, the process generates significantly more carbon dioxide than conventional oil production.

There is a less obvious but no less important reason many Canadians want the industry stopped: it is relentlessly twisting our society into something we don’t like. Canada is beginning to exhibit the economic and political characteristics of a petro-state.

Countries with huge reserves of valuable natural resources often suffer from economic imbalances and boom-bust cycles. They also tend to have low-innovation economies, because lucrative resource extraction makes them fat and happy, at least when resource prices are high.

Canada is true to type. When demand for tar sands energy was strong in recent years, investment in Alberta surged. But that demand also lifted the Canadian dollar, which hurt export-oriented manufacturing in Ontario, Canada’s industrial heartland. Then, as the export price of Canadian heavy crude softened in late 2012 and early 2013, the country’s economy stalled.

Canada’s record on technical innovation, except in resource extraction, is notoriously poor. Capital and talent flow to the tar sands, while investments in manufacturing productivity and high technology elsewhere languish.

But more alarming is the way the tar sands industry is undermining Canadian democracy. By suggesting that anyone who questions the industry is unpatriotic, tar sands interest groups have made the industry the third rail of Canadian politics.

The current Conservative government holds a large majority of seats in Parliament but was elected in 2011 with only 40 percent of the vote, because three other parties split the center and left vote. The Conservative base is Alberta, the province from which Prime Minister Stephen Harper and many of his allies hail. As a result, Alberta has extraordinary clout in federal politics, and tar sands influence reaches deep into the federal cabinet.

Both the cabinet and the Conservative parliamentary caucus are heavily populated by politicians who deny mainstream climate science. The Conservatives have slashed financing for climate science, closed facilities that do research on climate change, told federal government climate scientists not to speak publicly about their work without approval and tried, unsuccessfully, to portray the tar sands industry as environmentally benign.

The federal minister of natural resources, Joe Oliver, has attacked “environmental and other radical groups” working to stop tar sands exports. He has focused particular ire on groups getting money from outside Canada, implying that they’re acting as a fifth column for left-wing foreign interests. At a time of widespread federal budget cuts, the Conservatives have given Canada’s tax agency extra resources to audit registered charities. It’s widely assumed that environmental groups opposing the tar sands are a main target.

This coercive climate prevents Canadians from having an open conversation about the tar sands. Instead, our nation behaves like a gambler deep in the hole, repeatedly doubling down on our commitment to the industry.

President Obama rejected the pipeline last year but now must decide whether to approve a new proposal from TransCanada, the pipeline company. Saying no won’t stop tar sands development by itself, because producers are busy looking for other export routes – west across the Rockies to the Pacific Coast, east to Quebec, or south by rail to the United States. Each alternative faces political, technical or economic challenges as opponents fight to make the industry unviable.

Mr. Obama must do what’s best for America. But stopping Keystone XL would be a major step toward stopping large-scale environmental destruction, the distortion of Canada’s economy and the erosion of its democracy.

Thomas Homer-Dixon, who teaches global governance at the Balsillie School of International Affairs, is the author of “The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity and the Renewal of Civilization.”

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/ban-toxic-dispersants/

Date: Sun, 24 Mar 2013 10:31:03 -0400
Subject: Ban Toxic Dispersants Now!

Take one small step today to change oil industry practices

Dear Friends,
On March 24, 1989, the Exxon Valdez ran aground on Bligh Reef, spilling millions of gallons of oil and soiling thousands of miles of coast line. The Exxon Valdez oil spill wasn’t just an environmental disaster–it was a democracy crisis. The federal government and the courts failed to hold Exxon accountable for the harms it caused to people and the environment. It was back to business as usual for the oil industry while people bore the full costs of the disaster–a devastated ecosystem, socio-economic hardships, and illnesses.

Twenty-four years later, the federal government’s failure to hold Big Oil accountable to health and environmental laws is wreaking havoc in communities across America. From forced sales or eminent domain takings, to poisoned wells and ground water, to devastating health consequences from BP’s Deepwater Horizon disaster and Enbridge’s tar sands spill in Michigan, more and more Americans are finding their rights and powers are failing to protect what they love. More and more people are organizing for change.

Take one small step today to change oil industry practices–and help protect people from toxic chemicals used in oil spill dispersants, drilling fluids in fracking, and diluents for tar sands.

TAKE ACTION NOW!

1. Sign the Petition to Ban Toxic Dispersants
Tell the EPA that it is time to delist all products that are known to cause health problems to human beings.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/ban-toxic-dispersants/

2. Create broader awareness

Forward this email and ask friends, colleagues, and family members to sign the petition. Visit https://www.facebook.com/UltimateCivics to keep up-to-date on upcoming events and actions.

3. Follow us on https://www.facebook.com/UltimateCivics
Twitter @Ultimate_Civics to keep up-to-date on our progress and to learn other steps you can take to safe guard human health from these deadly chemicals.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.keysnet.com/2013/03/21/485987/bahamian-government-clears-way.html

How short-sighted that the Bahamian Minister of the Environment doesn’t see the clean energy potential of alternatives such as solar power. Instead, he is pursuing fossil fuel development in the pristine waters of the Bahamas that provide fisheries, tourism, and quality of life to all. The Bahamas is home to some of the healthiest corals in the Western Hemisphere. ……DV

By DAVID GOODHUE
dgoodhue@keysreporter.com
Posted – Thursday, March 21, 2013 08:18 PM EDT

The Bahamian government is allowing an oil company to conduct exploratory offshore drilling ahead of a referendum giving its citizens a say in the country’s future energy development.

The drilling would likely begin by early 2014 and be conducted by the Bahamas Petroleum Co. The operation would be near where Russian oil company Zarubezhneft is now drilling in Cuban waters in the Old Bahamas Channel south of the Andros Islands, which is next to Cuba’s exclusive economic zone with the Bahamas.

This would place another drilling operation less than 200 miles from Florida’s coast, which has at least one South Florida official concerned.

U.S. Rep. Joe Garcia, a Democrat whose district runs from Kendall to Key West, said Thursday that he fears what would happen to Florida’s coast in the event of a spill in the Bahamas

“I am very concerned to learn that off shore oil drilling will take place in our front yard and in the middle of the Gulfstream,” he said in a statement e-mailed to The Reporter. “If the Bahamas insist on moving forward with this process, I hope we can share safety standards and best practices that we have learned over the years.”

Kenred Dorsett, the Bahamas’ minister of environment and housing, said the decision to move forward with drilling before the referendum is held makes sense because there is no point in holding the ballot initiative if the Bahamas does not have economically viable offshore oil fields.

“More particularly, we are not going to ask the electorate to vote on whether they want to develop an oil industry if there is no oil to begin with,” Dorsett said in a statement last week. “Thus, we need to find out first, through exploration drilling, whether we do indeed have oil in commercially viable quantities. If we don’t, then obviously it would be completely pointless, and a shameful waste of public funds, to have a referendum on the matter.”

Dorsett said a national oil industry could help the Bahamas stem the rise of its national debt, and said there is growing support among the population to at least find out how much oil there is in Bahamian waters.

“At a time when our national debt burden is becoming increasingly difficult to bear, the Bahamian people are understandably asking whether we should not be focusing more closely on the question of whether oil exists in the Bahamas in commercially viable quantities,” Dorsett said. “If it does, it would likely mean substantially greater revenues for our country. Indeed, the discovery of oil in the Bahamas would almost certainly prove to be economically transformative for our nation for many generations to come.”

He added that Russia looking for oil about 60 miles away “dictates that we hasten our own decision-making process as it pertains to oil exploration and environmental regulation here in the Bahamas.”

BPC executives praised the government’s decision.

The “announcement paves the way for an assessment of the potential of oil resources on the Bahamian side of the border,” Simon Potter, BPC’s chief executive officer, said in a statement.

The BPC is seeking a partner company to help look for the oil.

The U.S. Geological Survey estimates the Bahamas hold up to 4.3 billion barrels of oil.

Bahamian Prime Minister Perry Christie’s Progressive Liberal Party is facing criticism from political opponents for changing his position on oil drilling. According to the Bahamian newspaper The Tribune, Dorsett just four months ago said no drilling would happen before the referendum, which isn’t expected to be held before 2015.

Dorsett, in his statement last week, promised that the nation’s regulations governing offshore oil exploration would mirror those enforced by countries like the United States, the United Kingdom, Norway, Australia and Trinidad and Tobago.

He also recognized that offshore oil operations pose a threat to the multi-island nation’s beaches and marine life — a major draw to the country’s tourism-dependent economy.

The Russian drilling operation in Cuba — and the proposed operation in the Bahamas — is in 1,000 to 2,000 feet and is considered shallow-water drilling. By contrast, the 2010 BP/DeepWater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico happened at more than 5,000 feet below the ocean surface.

A failed deepwater drilling operation in the Florida Straits — about 70 miles from Key West — was even deeper. Several international oil companies, starting in early 2012, leased a Chinese-built, Italian-owned semi-submersible rig to drill the depths between the Keys and Cuba.

The operation worried both U.S. environmentalists and opponents of Cuba’s communist Castro regime. But in the end, none of the companies found enough oil to indicate the area is fertile for future energy exploration.

The Cuban government was hoping for a major find that would turn the nation from being a net-energy importer to an exporter. Cuba relies largely on oil imports from Venezuela.

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/03/obama-keystone-poll-89108.html

Politico, March 20, 2013

By Erika Martinson

Environmentalists armed with new poll numbers have a warning for President Barack Obama: Approving the Keystone XL pipeline would put him at odds with core members of his base.

The poll reveals an electorate deeply split on the Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline, which is wildly popular among Republicans and almost equally unpopular among Democrats. A small majority of people overall either support the project or don’t know what to think, according to results provided to POLITICO.

But the Center for Biological Diversity, the group that commissioned the poll, says the president should pay attention to what his most fervent supporters are saying. Sixty-eight percent of people who voted for Obama want him to reject the pipeline, the poll found.

Opposition is especially strong among Obama voters age 18 to 29, according to the survey conducted by Public Policy Polling. More than 60 percent think he would be breaking his promises if he OKs the pipeline — and 16 percent would feel betrayed.

Of course, Obama has already won his second term and will most likely never face the electorate again. But he’s also spoken of his desire to keep his base fired up during his second term.

Keystone could put a quick kibosh to that, said Jerry Karnas, the environmental group’s national field director.

“This thing is a potential mass demoralizer for a large amount of Democrats,” Karnas said.

“Keystone is bad news for America, its wildlife and the future health of our climate — and the people who put President Obama in the White House know it,” he added.

Administration officials have repeatedly said they’ll make the pipeline decision based on facts and science. The White House stressed Tuesday that Keystone isn’t even on the president’s desk.

“In line with long-standing precedent, the State Department is conducting the assessment of the project,” White House spokesman Clark Stevens said. He added that Obama will pursue his promises to confront climate change at the same time that he supports efforts to increase U.S. energy independence.

Still, the poll’s findings offer a glimpse at some of the political considerations at play as the administration weighs its stance on Keystone, an issue that pits supporters’ promises of jobs and energy independence versus fervent opposition from climate activists.

Some people proffering advice for the president say approving the pipeline would be a smart move to the middle — for instance, a January editorial in the scientific journal Nature said it would “bolster his credibility within industry and among conservatives” as he pursues strong action on climate change.

But Karnas said Obama needs to think longer term.

“His legacy is really hanging in the balance right now,” Karnas said. “He’s looking a lot more like an oil and gas president than he is a solar, wind and innovation guy.”

© 2013 POLITICO LLC.

This article originally appeared here.

Photo © Paul S. Hamilton