Alberta Tar Sands
Location:
CanadaProject risks:
Environmental Destruction, Social HarmCompanies:
- Canadian Natural Resources Ltd (CNRL)
- Suncor Energy Inc
- Cenovus Energy Inc
- Exxon Mobil Corporation
- Imperial Oil Ltd
- MEG Energy Corp
- TotalEnergies SE
- CNOOC Ltd
- ConocoPhillips
- Chevron Corporation
- Shell plc
- China Petrochemical Corporation (Sinopec Group)
- Teck Resources Ltd
- Athabasca Oil Corporation
- BP plc
- China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC)
- PetroChina Company Ltd
- Connacher Oil And Gas Ltd
- Korea National Oil Corporation (KNOC)
- Strathcona Resources Ltd
- Sunshine Oilsands Ltd
- International Petroleum Corporation (IPC)
- Whitecap Resources Inc
- Greenfire Resources Operating Corporation
Approximate location. By zooming in, you can recognize the open mine pits and tailing ponds of the tar sands companies.
The Dirtiest Project on Earth
Alberta's tar sands oil extraction is one of the dirtiest projects on Earth.14401 Most of Canada’s oil comes from tar sands that lie beneath an area larger than England.14391 If all of Alberta's tar sands oil were burned, global temperatures would rise by 0.4 °C (32.7°F).14393 This alone would take our world beyond the critical 1.5 °C limit.
To get to the oil, Canadian Natural Resources (CNRL), Suncor Energy, Cenovus Energy, ExxonMobil, Imperial Oil and others are destroying Canada’s ancient boreal forest. Large deposits of Canada’s tar sands are located underneath the trees. Tar sands are a mix of tar, clay, sands and bitumen, an unconventional type of oil.14395 Oil companies get the bitumen out of the ground in 2 ways, either they mine it from the surface or they extract it from deep under the ground.14397 In more than half of Alberta, the bitumen lies so deep in the ground that they must drill wells and inject steam to extract it.14399 To get to the shallow layers, oil companies cut down the trees and blast away the fertile topsoil. In their quest for oil, more than 25 companies are draining wetlands and changing the natural course of Alberta’s rivers and streams. They leave large lakes of poisonous waste and gigantic open mine pits in thousands of square miles of destroyed landscape behind.14403
Impacts on Health and Environment
Before the bulldozers came, Canada’s boreal forest made up 25 percent of the Earth’s remaining intact forests.14405 The boreal forest stretches across northern Alaska, Canada, Northern Europe and Russia.14407 Unknown to many, it is not a uniform forest; it’s a patchwork of coniferous and hardwood forests, wetlands, rivers and lakes. The huge amounts of carbon that the forest stores make it a life-support system for the planet.14409 Boreal forests hold almost twice as much carbon as Rainforests do.[1] Over thousands of years, the forest has stored carbon in its trees, its wetlands and deep in permafrost soil. As oil and gas companies are cutting down the ancient trees, they are releasing huge amounts of carbon into the atmosphere.14413 James Hansen, Director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies says: “If Canada proceeds, and we do nothing, it will be game over for the climate."14415
When ExxonMobil, Suncor and co. mine the oil, they produce toxic waste referred to as tailings. These tailings are a slurry of water, fine sand particles, chemicals, heavy metals and other petrochemical waste.14417 Oil companies are dumping this poisonous brew into enormous human-made lakes. The companies call them tailing ponds.14419 Some of these so-called ponds are lakes big enough to fill more than 500,000 Olympic swimming pools.14421 Alberta’s tar sands companies have produced more than 1.4 trillion liters of poisonous tailings. And the toxic lakes are getting bigger every day.14423
The toxic lakes make people ill. They are full of poisons such as lead, arsenic, benzene and mercury.14425 The chemicals cause nervous system damage, higher rates of cancer and rare types of childhood cancer. 14427 The slurry from tailing ponds seeps continuously into Alberta’s groundwaters, lakes and rivers.1442914431 Even as far as 200 km (124 mi) away from the Alberta extraction sites, cancer rates have increased by 30 percent.[2] Until today, oil companies have not taken responsibility for the consequences of their activities.14435
The tar sands companies turn the water and land of indigenous First Nations into a sacrifice zone.14437 They have been using so much water for oil production that water levels have become dangerously low.14439 The few fish people can still catch are too polluted to eat.14441 Many indigenous communities are struggling to make enough money to survive.14443 Often people are left with no choice but to work for the industry that has destroyed the land and waters they depend on.14445 The Beaver Lake Cree Nation is now fighting a legal battle to stop the ever-hungry tar sands expansionists. 35,000 oil and gas sites are eating away the water and lands of the indigenous Nation and keep them from their rights to fish, hunt and gather plants.14447 For this reason, the people of Beaver Lake Cree Nation have decided to sue the governments in Canada and Alberta that authorized the tar sands mines and other destructive industrial projects on the Nation’s traditional lands.14449 Their goal is clear. They do not want to stop one specific mine, project or company, but “all of them at once”.14451
Government Greenwashing
For decades, civil society and First Nations both in Canada and the US have criticized and challenged tar sands pipelines due to leaks and environmental damage. The Canadian government reacted to the criticism by actively promoting pipelines and tar sands as safe, reliable and responsible. Altogether, it has spent USD 30 million of tax payers’ money on pro-pipeline and tar sands advertising campaigns.14453
Banks: Masters of Hypocrisy
Banks are coming under increasing pressure to stop funding tar sands companies. Standard Chartered, Deutsche Bank, Crédit Agricole and others have said that they will no longer finance tar sands projects. However, they continue to give unspecified loans to the exact same tar sands companies.14455 In this way, these companies can still use the money for their tar sands projects. In fact, tar sands financing has increased since 2016.14457 Supporting one of the dirtiest projects on earth in the middle of the climate crisis is a huge reputational risk for any financial institution.
“Our ancestors have lived on these lands for thousands of years and the decimation of the land, air, water, vegetation in the past 40 years of tar sands mining is the worst any industrialized country has seen ever. Worst case for our people living downstream is the multitude of rare cancers we are living and dying with while the governments continue to give approvals for further development.”
George J. Poitras, Former Chief of the Mikisew Cree First Nation[3]
Groups working on Alberta Tar Sands: Above Ground, Rainforest Action Network, Climate Action Network, RAVEN Trust, Greenpeace, Environmental Defence, Indigenous Environmental Network, International Treaty Organization, Sierra Club, Concerned Scientists, David Suzuki Foundation, The Natural Resources Defense Council, Earth Works, Amnesty International, Canadian Wilderness Committee, Ducks Unlimited, BankTrack, Oil Change International, Stop Line 3, Treaty Alliance Against Tar Sands Expansion, 350org
Sources:
Further Reading:
https://environmentaldefence.ca/report/report-reality-check-water-and-the-tar-sands/
https://www.banktrack.org/page/banks_and_tar_sands_1
https://www.nrdc.org/sites/default/files/TarSandsInvasion-full.pdf
