VIEWPOINTS
Terrace Standard Wednesday, January 11, 2012
www.terracestandard.com A7
The Mail Bag Oil profiteers hard at work Dear Sir: The Harper government is pushing for acceleration of the Northern Gateway approval process now that the Keystone project through the U.S. has been delayed. There have been great efforts to explain the dangers of the project. But there are other aspects which are objectionable. With tar sands extraction expansion, mayors in the affected regions have pleaded with the oil industry to slow down. They cannot keep up with housing and infrastructure for more workers trained elsewhere. The service sector cannot attract workers for lower-paying jobs in these goldrush communities. Housing costs are so high that people cannot afford to move there and raise families, an important factor for any civilized society. Workers drive vast distances in large vehicles every week or two, and many are flown in and out. There are 90,000 “temporary” workers in camps. Camp culture is not healthy for a society. Jobs are created where they are not needed while manufacturing jobs in traditional employment areas evaporate in Ontario, Quebec, B.C. The revenues for oil in Canada are the lowest in the world. When revenues were minimal during Peter Lougheed’s tenure, the royalties were $3/barrel. This was reduced to $2/barrel. When the price of oil sky rocketed, it was proposed to return to $3/
barrel. The oil industry objected and got their way. Who is really in control of the provincial and federal governments? It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that we live in a petro-state. When some people in government suggested that one or two refineries ought to be built here, the oil giants once again cried foul and demanded that government put up the money for construction. As a taxpayer, I’m insulted when they produce oil for $25 a barrel, sell it for $90 and then insist the taxpayer contribute the cost of building a plant to refine it. The federal government (taxpayer) shelled out $1.3 billion for tar sands expansion. Ontario and Quebec still import the oil from off-shore. Would it not make more sense to use our own resources and product? Why are we paying “world price” for our own oil? This doesn’t happen in other oil producing countries. It should be quite clear with information from many, many sources that the oil industry cares little about you, me and the country. They look strictly at the bottom line with support from some of our governments. To hell with the environment, climate change, inflation; it only really affects the common people. Stand up and fight for something irreplaceable and against short-term profits for multinational corporations. Dieter Wagner, Kitimat, B.C.
Who is the boss in B.C.?
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
CRUDE OIL pumped up via Leduc No. 1 in Alberta in 1947 spurred on the oil industry, which has made that province wealthy.
Dear Sir: In a late 2011 CBC Radio interview on the study of the oil and gas industry of northeastern B.C., provincial health minister Mike de Jong referred to the “benefits” of the industry to the province. The benefits are short-term jobs and limited tax revenue in the rush for profit. Longterm damage to water, land, and air by the hydrocarbon industry is ignored. That industry is not solely responsible; consumers who refuse to act on the already large body of evidence of damage are also to blame. To compare the upcoming study of B.C.’s oil and gas industry with the “Stop the Violence” campaign by B.C. physicians, judges, and police chiefs to legalize and regulate marijuana reveals the nature of our country at the moment. Prime Minister Harper has categorically refused to even consider the evidence.
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What the Prime Minister wants, he usually gets
T
he one topic that is sure to stir controversy in 2012 is the Enbridge Northern Gateway Proj-
ect. The project combines the politically sensitive subjects of environment and economy. It is the kind of project that does not lend itself to compromise: if environmental arguments prevail the project will not proceed, and if economic arguments prevail, it will be at the expense of the environment. The debate is essentially an emotional one as neither the economic nor the environmental argument can be supported by indisputable facts. Enbridge cannot guarantee that their proposed pipeline will never fail, nor can those who fear just such a spill guarantee that one will inevitably occur. The same holds true for the economic argument. There will likely be a blip in local employment during the construction phase, but unlike major construction projects such as mills or hydro dams,
pipeline construction projects are not local, they are transitory. In an open letter, Enbridge Inc. has invited British Columbians to participate in the public hearings to be held on their project, “to engage in the conversation based on informed, knowledge-based opinions.” This is a challenging invitation as the meaning of the word “opinion” is “a belief or conclusion held with confidence but not substantiated by positive knowledge or proof.” People concerned about the environmental risk associated with the project may want to refer to the October 10, 2006, Rainbow Pipe Line Company Ltd. crude oil spill near Slave Lake, and to the 11 follow-up actions the company committed to in the Alberta Energy and Utilities Board Investigation Report of May 9, 2007. Less than five years later, on April 29, 2011, Alberta’s Energy Resources Conservation Board reported the largest crude oil spill in 36 years – from a Rainbow Pipe Line Company Ltd. facility
GUEST COMMENT
ANDRE CARREL near Little Buffalo. The reports about the Rainbow Pipe Line spills are not opinions; they are informed, knowledgebased facts. Rainbow is not the only pipeline company to have experienced spills. The source of the July 2010 crude oil spill near Kalamazoo, Michigan, was an Enbridge pipeline. That too is an informed, knowledge-based fact.
Such facts notwithstanding, a concern about a possible future spill from the proposed pipeline in this region can only be a conclusion held with confidence but not substantiated by positive knowledge or proof. How does one submit positive proof of a crude oil spill into the Skeena River to the public hearings before such a spill has occurred? Supporters of the project will have a much easier time to present arguments substantiated by positive knowledge and proof to the National Energy Board hearings. Supporters may refer to the Prime Minister’s year-end interview with CTV where he assured Lisa LaFlamme that he was “very serious about selling our oil off this continent,” leaving no doubt about his commitment to sell oil from Alberta’s bitumen deposits to China. What is a citizen to do in a situation of this kind? The National Energy Board will be holding hearings, but to what end? All in-
dications are that the Prime Minister’s mind is made up: Alberta crude will be sold to China. Can the National Energy Board overrule the Prime Minister? Those who set out to challenge the Prime Minister’s powers have had little success. The government was compelled to abandon plans for a national securities regulator after the Supreme Court of Canada ruled the matter to be within provincial constitutional powers. But, in other controversial and contested issues where the Prime Minister’s mind was made up, those who did not share the Prime Minister’s “opinion” had little success. Andre Carrel is a retired public sector administrator living in Terrace, BC. For those interested in the National Energy Board’s Northern Gateway Pipeline public hearings, the Terrace session takes place at the Sportsplex tomorrow (January 12). The session begins at 1 p.m.