Social Damage

Scandal Rocks Key Player in Canada's Oil Sands PR Push

jessie — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 09:53:47 -0700

Scandal Rocks Key Player in Canada's Oil Sands PR Push

Geoff Dembicki, 25 March 2011, TheTyee.ca--A former advisor to Prime Minister Stephen Harper -- now at the centre of a major political scandal -- worked closely with Canada's biggest energy companies over past years to improve the public image of Alberta's oil sands.

That advisor, Bruce Carson, did this while leading an academic think tank funded with $15 million in federal money.

What this suggests, say environmental advocates, is that the line dividing Harper's Conservative government from Canada's oil industry is very blurry, if it exists at all.

"Carson is the spider at the centre of the web... directing the whole pro-tar sands effort," Greenpeace Canada's Keith Stewart told The Tyee. "He's been moving between the political and business worlds to make that happen."

As previous reporting in this series explained, the close relationship between Canadian government officials and major oil companies has existed since at least 2008, when a lobbying coalition formed to battle clean energy laws in the United States.

But until recently, The Tyee's investigation has uncovered few direct linkages between the Prime Minister's Office and major oil sands players. Carson's advocacy, as documents below would suggest, appears to establish such a linkage.

Allegedly flogging connections for girlfriend

Carson's oil sands connections are less well known these days than the lobbying which has landed him in the middle of an RCMP investigation.

The 66-year-old former political advisor reportedly used his political connections to land a lucrative contract for his 22-year-old fiancée, previously a prostitute.

Allegations of criminal influence-peddling have created a national scandal for Harper's Conservative government.

Federal Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff jumped on the Carson case earlier this week to gain political ammunition for what many observers expect to be an imminent federal election.

"How can Canadians remain trusting of a government guilty of such flagrant abuse of power?" Ignatieff said in Question Period.

Though such issues are worthy of discussion, Greenpeace's Stewart said, much more significant in the long-term are Carson's close connections to Alberta's oil sands industry.

Until Carson left the Prime Minister's Office in 2008, he was considered one of Harper's top political advisors -- a "grey-haired sage," according to one insider.

Carson left to become executive director for the Canada School of Energy and Environment, a think-tank started with $15 million in federal government money the year before.

Though ostensibly a research-oriented group with links to three Alberta universities, Carson's role was much more "political" than "academic," Stewart said.

Moving back into Prime Minister's Office

The Conservative insider took a brief leave in 2009 to work again for the Prime Minister's Office, where he was a key political advisor for Harper.

In March 2010, and back with the School of Energy, Carson met with the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers -- a major lobby group representing Canada's oil and gas players -- and officials from the Alberta government and Natural Resources Canada.

The purpose of their meeting was to discuss "outreach and communications" for Alberta's oil sands industry.

The public relations strategy they discussed "would not just 'turn up the volume,'" read briefing notes obtained by Climate Action Network Canada, "it would change tact and address perceptions by showing that the issues are being addressed and we have the right attitude."

Translated into plain English, Stewart said, the group was worried about messages raised by environmental organization -- that oil sands development was destroying pristine Boreal forest and spewing greenhouse gases.

That was part of the reason the group met, Carson said in an interview with Postmedia, but not all of it.

"You can communicate all you want, but if you have nothing to communicate, you're not going to go anywhere, so the idea was [that] we had to really up the environmental game," he said.

"The other part of it, to be fair, was trying to establish some sort of protocol to deal with the attacks that were coming on a fairly regular basis."

Carson also worked directly with the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers to produce a briefing paper for a series of oil sands dialogues taking place across the country.

The paper, with Carson listed as author, argues that "the economic and security value of oil sands expansion will likely outweigh the climate damage that oil sands create -- but climate concerns are not to be ignored."

Carson's paper also notes that clean energy efforts in the U.S., and in particular the push to develop a low carbon fuel standard, "will need to be carefully monitored as [they] could have a potentially negative effect on oil sands imports."

Indeed, previous reporting in this series detailed how major fossil fuel players launched an often successful campaign -- with the "support" of the Canadian government -- to derail any attempt to enact such a standard.

High profile before scandal

In April 2010, Carson appeared before a Canadian Senate committee on energy and the environment.

Here he described the urgent need for an oil sands pipeline to B.C.'s west coast -- presumably something along the lines of Enbridge's Northern Gateway project.

"It will be difficult, given the atmosphere and regulatory approach in which we now live, to see a pipeline being built any time soon," Carson told the committee. "The work you are doing could address that."

Carson made implicit reference to clean energy laws being proposed in America.

"Right now," he added, "if we say to the United States that we will take our ball and go home and go elsewhere, I think they would say, 'Good luck to you,' because there are not many other places to go."

More recently, Carson was appointed to a panel studying water quality downstream from oil sands operations in the Athabasca River.

After the recent scandal erupted, Carson took a leave of absence from the panel. And for the time being, he's no longer leading the Canada School of Energy and Environment.

Greenpeace's Stewart said with an election looming, the Canadian public should start questioning the Harper government's often too-close relationship to Canada's major oil sands players.

"I liken Carson to a political quarterback for the oil industry and the Harper government," Stewart said. "Harper sees the interests of the oil industry as being the same thing as the national interest. We would respectfully disagree."

If Stewart compares Carson to a quarterback, others within Ottawa's circle of power gave him another name. He was known as "the Mechanic."

Why? "I fix things," Carson explained to a reporter. That was before he became embroiled in a scandal that mixes sex, influence and well oiled connections to the Prime Minister of Canada.

On Monday: Why green groups -- and the public -- are still in the dark about most of the Canadian government's lobbying for the oil sands in Washington D.C .

Geoff Dembicki reports for The Tyee with a focus on the Alberta oil sands and the fossil fuels industry.

Toxic Tour Visits West Windsor

jessie — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 06:17:21 -0700

Toxic Tour Visits West Windsor

Owen Wolter, October 12, 2010, Windsorite.ca--The Global Day for Action on Climate Change didn’t just pass by in Windsor.

The Windsor On Watch TOXIC TOUR took a group of around thirty environmentally concerned people on a trip (via a Transit Windsor hybrid bus) to a number of notorious pollution sites in west Windsor.

Speaking about June’s major plastics fire in the west-end, Suzy Myskow, organizer of the Toxic Tour recalled, “The firemen said [to me] they couldn’t even put it out because the smoke that would be generated would be worse than if they just let it burn out…and it was highly carcinogenic”.

Myskow described the Tour’s purpose in the west end. “We gave out a number of dishonourable mentions”, she said while listing known pollution sites and catalysts to climate change, “We did the West Windsor Power Plant, Nemak, ADM Agra Industries, and BP Canada.”

“We chose to do just the N9C postal code,” said Myskow, who planned and led the tour.

Windsor On Watch made use of Scorecard.org, the US’s Environmental Protection Agency’s Toxic Release Inventory and 350.org to discover what types of pollutants were being expelled from nearby factories.

Myskow described the Toxic Tour as a great educational success for participants and hopes to plan more events like this in the future, “We did one honourable mention site in the area, and it was Ojibway Park.”

Windsor On Watch will be launching their blog soon at http://windsoronwatch.wordpress.com and will have pictures from the Toxic Tour up shortly.

Oil-processing gear's U.S. route sparks fears

jessie — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 06:56:22 -0700

Oil-processing gear's U.S. route sparks fears

John S. Adams, USA TODAY, June 15, HELENA, Mont. — As the nation anxiously watches the catastrophic continuing Gulf oil spill, one portion of the country is growing concerned about another oil-related issue — a plan to transport the enormous machinery required to build an oil-
processing plant in Canada.

The immediate issue is not the plant itself — which would extract oil from sand — but the disruptions and environmental issues involved with trucking more than 200 massive pieces of Korean-built processing equipment along the path of Lewis and Clark and adjacent to famed wild and scenic rivers in Northern Rockies.

Some of the loads will be as large as 24 feet wide by 30 feet tall and up to 160 feet in length and the largest rigs will weigh as much as 150 tons or more. According to Montana's environmental assessment, Canadian oil giant Imperial Oil is
expected to spend more than $40 million in Montana to upgrade roadways and relocate utilities to accommodate trucks along the route.

'Destructive project'

The anticipated route from Idaho's Port of Lewistown to Canada's Alberta oil sands will take the rigs along the banks of Idaho's Lochsa River, a world-class fishery and popular whitewater destination, and Montana's Blackfoot River, of author Norman Maclean's A River Runs Through It fame.

The Athabasca oil sands are a massive deposit of bitumen — a tar-like form of petroleum — located in northern Alberta. According to the Government of Alberta Energy Department, bitumen, unlike conventional oil, requires intensive processing
before it can be pumped into pipelines and transported to U.S. refineries. Environmental groups, such as the Polaris Institute, have called the Canadian oil sands "the most destructive project on earth."

Imperial Oil has filed plans with transportation officials in Montana and Idaho to begin hauling the necessary equipment starting in October. The project would last about a year, according to the proposal.

Proponents of the project claim Imperial's proposal is a one-time project that will bring millions of dollars in revenue and economic benefits to cash-strapped communities along the route.

Tanker Opponents Respond to Enbridge Regulatory Application Multiple Years of Wasted Time, Energy, and Money to Ensue

jessie — Fri, 28 May 2010 08:05:22 -0700

Tanker Opponents Respond to Enbridge Regulatory Application Multiple Years of Wasted Time, Energy, and Money to Ensue

MAY 27, 2010, VICTORIA – Responding to Enbridge’s filing of an application late today for their Northern Gateway tar sands pipeline and tanker project to BC’s coast, Dogwood Initiative’s Eric Swanson says:

“Unless Enbridge changes its mind like it did in 2006, we will now begin years of wasted time, energy, and money on a process that is not properly constituted, whose outcome is virtually guaranteed to be challenged in the courts, all for a project that the overwhelming majority of First Nations and coastal residents have said they will not let happen”

“Dogwood Initiative has been studying this proposal ever since it was announced in 2005. We cannot imagine a scenario where Enbridge, or any proponent, is able to overcome the political forces organized against a new West Coast pipeline. And we consider ourselves a fairly imaginative group of people.”

“The opposition to Enbridge’s project is growing by the day. If Enbridge CEO Patrick Daniel persists in ignoring the desires of British Columbians it will cost his company and this project’s investors a lot of wasted time, energy, brand capital and ultimately money.”

For its part, Dogwood Initiative will continue to work with its 25,000 supporters, and the growing coalition of First Nations, businesses, organizations, and prominent Canadians arrayed against the Northern Gateway project. British Columbians have been standing up and shutting down oil tanker proposals for close to fourty years. The organization is committed to helping the people of this province channel that same sentiment into this review.

Dogwood Initiative is a BC-based non-governmental organization that is campaigning for a permanent, federal oil tanker ban on the BC coast, with the aim of protecting coastal communities and ecosystems from what we feel would be inevitable oil spills. The campaign currently has over 25,000 supporters.

Oilsands not above law

jessie — Mon, 17 May 2010 06:15:00 -0700

Oilsands not above law

Janet Keeping, Calgary Sun, May 15, 2010--Alberta’s primary oil and gas regulator recently announced that Syncrude, the largest oilsands mining company, does not have to meet the tailings ponds cleanup standards established by the regulator last winter.

Although officials with the Energy Resources Conservation Board earlier pronounced those standards “firm, final and non-negotiable,” it turns out they are no such thing.

The government’s disdain for the rule of law, especially in connection with oilsands developments, is nevertheless disturbing.

Oilsands pro-jects pose myriad threats. Many, such as pollution of ground water and consumption of relatively clean natural gas to produce much dirtier synthetic crude, are well-known.

But less attention is paid to the erosion of the rule of law caused by failure to properly regulate the projects — not just in Alberta, but also at the national level.

Ottawa has authority over several matters central to oilsands controversies — amongst them, Aboriginal peoples and their lands, fish habitat, and interprovincial effects of the projects.

There is little action on any of these mandates.

Since the 13th century, when the Magna Carta was added to English statute books, the rule of law has afforded protection from arbitrary government.

Canada is one of the few lucky countries to have the rule of law constitutionally guaranteed. Citizens have to obey speeding laws, or get a ticket, and pay taxes, or risk a fine, or worse.

The more powerful also have to obey the law.

That’s a major reason we as a society buy into our system of governance — it’s fair because everyone is subject to it.

When ordinary citizens notice the more rich and powerful aren’t suffering consequences for breaking the law, their trust in the system starts to falter. Why should I tell the truth on my tax return when others don’t? Or why obey laws against drinking-and-driving when I see former MPs don’t have to?

Our governments must also hold resource development companies to account. Failing to do so undermines our belief that we should obey the law because our system treats everyone equally. Why should we hold such belief, when the rich and powerful — i.e. shareholders of delinquent companies — do not have to conform to our laws ?

We should care about such things because people are much better off in a country with the rule of law than in one without it.

All laws are vulnerable without the primacy of law and independent judges and honest police to enforce the rules. Without rule of law, rampant corruption is a sure thing. Think Russia or Nigeria.

We tolerate erosion of the rule of law at our collective peril. As we have seen with the financial sector, if we turn a blind eye to illegality — perhaps because a company or an industry is thought “too big to fail” — we may pay far more for abandonment of the rule of law than if the problem been dealt with in the first place, as in the case of tailings from oilsands developments.

Rules must be imposed fairly, even against companies as powerful as Syncrude.

The end — development of the oil sands — even if otherwise defensible, does not justify the means. Governments which permit the rule of law to erode fail to protect one of the institutions necessary to a fair and decent society.

Some call this casual disregard for the rule of law in oil and gas based economies “petro-politics.”

Whatever the label, it must stop.

Keeping is a lawyer and president of the Sheldon Chumir Foundation for Ethics in Leadership.

Canada's tar sands: a dangerous solution to offshore oil

jessie — Tue, 11 May 2010 07:10:45 -0700

Canada's tar sands: a dangerous solution to offshore oil

Heather McRobie, May 11, 2010, The Guardian--As the clean-up of the disastrous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico continues, the US may finally begin to rethink its position on off-shoring drilling. As usual, change is frustratingly slow, and almost imperceptible: environmental groups like the Centre for Biological Diversity have criticised the Mineral Management Service, the US agency that oversees oil extraction, for its "business as usual" approach during the disaster, and expressed concerns that the Obama administration has waived environmental reviews of more than 20 new off-shore drilling projects even as the Deepwater Horizon spill continues.

Still, a glimmer of environmental hope has come from the unlikely source of Californian governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who withdrew his support to expand off-shore exploration off California's coast in the wake of the BP oil spill. It may be hard for climate-change activists to admit, but Schwarzenegger's move seems impressive, particularly considering the pressure he faces to ditch environmental concerns to save California's flailing economy. The governor's turnaround on off-shore drilling comes as he faces increasing pressure to abandon California's commitment to the 2006 Global Warming Solutions Act to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25% by 2020. Opponents have collected enough signatures to put an initiative on November's ballot to delay the implementation of the act until unemployment falls below 5.5%.

In this political climate, Schwarzenegger's change of heart on off-shore drilling could bolster environmental campaigning efforts to reduce offshore projects nationwide: if recession-suffering California can do it, so can the rest of the country.

The problem comes if California shifts its consumption of oil to a more carbon-intensive source. David Hughes of the Post Carbon Initiative has noted that, even if offshore drilling is banned in California, it will have little positive environmental impact if the state's current demand for oil is just met from other sources. One likely source in particular will only worsen the situation: oil from the Canadian tar sands are already the biggest source of US oil imports, and Alberta's recoverable reserves are now estimated to be the second-largest worldwide after Saudi Arabia. And unlike oil from Saudi Arabia, Albertan oil is literally in the sand itself, so refining it is up to five times as energy-intensive as refining crude oil.

Alberta premier Ed Stelmach wasted little time visiting Washington to promote Canadian oil sands as a "safer" option in the wake of the Gulf of Mexico disaster – referring to the oil sands as an "unconventional" source, as though one of the most destructive variants of fossil fuel extraction was merely a friendly alternative.

This is the moment that Canada's prime minister Stephen Harper has presumably been waiting for. While the US has, at least so far, resisted a complete dependency on Albertan sand oil, this environmentally disastrous from of petrol is widening its share of the global market. Despite the recession's impact on Albertan oil production, Albertan oil company Enbridge Inc is going ahead with its plans to build a 1,200km oil sand pipeline to supply Asian markets. Canadian oil companies have begun to actively court China, whose consumption of Albertan oil has increased dramatically in the last five years: the Canadian government recently approved a £1.5bn investment giving PetroChina a 60% stake in two new Albertan oil sand projects. Canadian oil is also reaching European markets: the new Greenpeace report revealed that Albertan tar sands oil has been indirectly entering the EU's petrol supply unbeknown to consumers, and indicated that this is likely to become more widespread.

Defenders of Canada's deals with China – hardly known for its environmental record – argue that it was a reasonable response to the decline in American interest in Albertan oil. The Obama administration in particular has shown itself to be ambivalent about Canadian oil. Harper's government and Albertan politicians seem to have made it a priority to win America over to Albertan oil – and are being lent support for this from surprising quarters.

Amid the popular (if characteristically understated) patriotism stoked by the Vancouver Winter Olympics, heightened scrutiny of Harper's environmental policies (if "policy" is the right word for a man who dismissed the Kyoto Protocol as a "socialist scheme" and then did his best to undermine a successor agreement) received a defensive response even from Harper's Canadian critics: now wasn't the time to tolerate "Canada bashing" abroad.

Similarly, when in 2009 Canada came last on a WWF scorecard of G8 countries' environmental policies, and the Obama administration's clean energy and security bill looked set to disproportionately harm the Albertan oil trade, Canadians were quick to note America's hypocrisy, and perhaps understandably resented being lectured by the world's largest and most profligate consumer. The problem is, none of the arguments that Canada is being somehow unfairly maligned actually contradict the point that the Alberta tar sands are evidently an unmitigated disaster for the environment, or that Canada's carbon emissions are estimated to have increased by 26% since the Kyoto Protocol.

With Alberta's premier happily capitalising on the Deepwater Horizon disaster to win the US over to Albertan oil, and Schwarzenegger backtracking on offshore oil drilling, recession-hit California and ambitious Alberta would be a match made in petrodollar heaven: Alberta would once again be secure as the dominant petrol supplier to the US, and the deal is far more palatable for America than its main alternative of tar sand oil, Chavez's Venezuela. For America as well as for Europe, Albertan oil is increasingly the best option from a political point of view – but never from an environmental one. The Gulf of Mexico disaster could trigger a wider environmental catastrophe if the US's search for new petrol sources points it back in the direction of Alberta.

Stakeholders look at future of Canada’s crude oil production, oil sands: Companies are looking to Asia as the next frontier...

jessie — Mon, 03 May 2010 14:02:57 -0700

Stakeholders look at future of Canada’s crude oil production, oil sands: Companies are looking to Asia as the next frontier...

HARRIS MACLEOD, The Hill Times, May 3, 2010--As demand for crude oil from the Alberta tar sands somewhat declines in the United States, and fears about the political viability of the oil patch multiply, companies are looking to Asia as the next frontier for selling Canada’s oil.

Oil companies, such as Enbridge and TransCanada, have built an overcapacity of pipelines to bring oil to the Midwest United States where demand is less than they originally thought, and now are looking to build pipelines from Alberta to the Pacific Coast to capitalize on markets in Asia and California, said Richard Girard from the Polaris Institute. “The future plans for Enbridge is to try to get oil to Asian markets, and California by shipping it to the Pacific Coast, putting it on big tankers and sending it across the ocean or down the Pacific Coast to California. But also really focusing on their regional systems in the tar sands, like building little pipelines for each producer,” he said.

These plans could prove contentious, however, because the massive pipeline to Kitimat, B.C., would have to go through many First Nations communities. But Enbridge is no stranger to controversy over its extensive network of pipelines. The 1,600 km, $1.2-billion Alberta Clipper pipeline was finished earlier this month, and will ship oil from Alberta, through Saskatchewan and Manitoba, and into Minnesota and Wisconsin. Aboriginal resistance to the project has been significant, but the pipeline is already starting to fill with crude. It will initially transport about 450,000 barrels of oil per day, with an ultimate capacity of about 800,000 barrels per day.

“Enbridge is going to come against a lot of resistance from the local communities on this because it’s going to be such an invasive project,” said Mr. Girard. “The risk of a spill is very real, but also there’s going to be a lot more oil tankers coming into Kitimat and the risk of an oil spill form one of those tankers is there as well.”

The recent massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Louisiana, which has produced an oil slick the size of Alaska that is visible from space, has reminded people of how destructive a spill can be. According to Mr. Girard, between 1999 and 2008, across all of Enbridge’s operations there were close to 21-million litres in hydrocarbons released into the environment, amounting to approximately half of the oil spilled in the Exxon Valdez disaster of 1988. Oil spills, massive GHG emissions, and other environmental impacts associated with the oil sands are causing the economic juggernaut to be increasingly viewed as a risky business, with some advocates broadening their message to target the economic risks of investing in Alberta oil.

Shareholders from companies with operations in the oil sands, including BP, Royal Dutch Shell, ConocoPhillips, and ExxonMobil, filed shareholder resolutions demanding that the risks from operating in the oil sands be fully investigated, quantified, and disclosed. While these resolutions have only gained tepid traction with voting shareholders, the trend for exhaustive risk disclosure is increasing in lock-step with the perceived risks from investing in the oil sands. Shareholders cite uncertainty around the cost of future carbon liabilities in the presence of a carbon price, lawsuits from leaks from toxic tailings ponds, and the operations’ voracious water consumption among their concerns.

The companies insist that their risk disclosure through their annual reports, Securities Exchange Commission filings, and other platforms is fully adequate. The Securities and Exchange Commission in the United States recently released interpretive guidance as to how to disclose environmental risks, with important implications for oil sands developments, particularly in the absence of clear federal climate change legislation.

The U.S. is still in the process of hammering out a national climate change policy, which could penalize emissions-intensive Canadian oil. If the U.S. legislature fails to pass a comprehensive climate bill, however, the Environmental Protection Agency could use its legal authority to regulate emitters. Additionally, California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard, which sets maximums for the “well-to-wheels” carbon content of fuels and which has been adopted by over a dozen U.S. states, has the potential to prevent carbon-intense Albertan crude from making the cut south of the border.

Despite Lisa Raitt’s (Halton, Ont.), the former minister of natural resources, assertion in a letter to California State Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger that the Low Carbon Fuel Standard “discriminated” against Canadian crude and could be perceived as an “unfair trade barrier,” the state has continued to develop its standard without making special exceptions for Alberta’s heavy oil.

Muddy Water II: Syncrude Ducks The Issue

jessie — Mon, 03 May 2010 10:28:06 -0700

Muddy Water II: Syncrude Ducks The Issue

Adam Driedzic, May 3, 2010,---The prosecution has delivered its closing arguments in the case of R. v. Syncrude. Syncrude’s non-suit application was dismissed, and it will be forced to plead a defence against evidence that could see it convicted. The public interest this case has generated is warranted, but after two months of tar and feathers it can be hard to distinguish political debate about the oil sands from the actual legal issues.

The Environmental Law Centre’s vision is of an environment protected by informed citizen participation and sound law and policy, effectively applied. To help the public understand the implications of the pending verdict, this post addresses questions that have dominated in media throughout the trial.

Is Syncrude charged with killing the ducks?

No: Evidence that the birds died is relevant, but the actual charges are:

1. Allowing hazardous substances to contact animals counter to s.155 of Alberta’s Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act (EPEA).

2. Depositing hazardous substances in an area frequented by migratory birds counter to section 5.1 of Canada’s Migratory Birds Convention Act (MBCA).

Is this “double jeopardy”?

No: Being charged with multiple offences is common. Double Jeopardy means that you cannot be punished twice for one offence. If there are two guilty findings punishment for both requires that the offences be different either factually or legally. The Court will interpret the two provisions above.

Did the Court spend much time on obvious facts?

Yes: The Crown has the burden of proving that the act occurred. Between the two charges, it had to prove that: the substance was hazardous, it contacted animals, a deposit was made, and birds frequented the area. Syncrude could have conceded any of these facts at any time and the trial would move on.

Were these facts proven?

Largely: By dismissing Syncrude’s non-suit motion, the Court has now determined that there is some evidence on which a properly instructed judge could convict. It has dismissed the claim that ‘it was the ducks that contacted the substance’ as counter to the purpose of EPEA. Likewise, it held that the ‘area frequented’ would be a larger space around the hazard, so as to uphold the purpose of protecting migratory birds. Syncrude will need to make a defence.

Does Syncrude have a permit for tailings ponds?

Yes: Operating oil sands requires authorization for listed activities and water diversion from Alberta Environment, management plans approved by Alberta’s Energy Resources Conservation Board, and often federal permits under the Fisheries Act and others.

Are the permits a defence?

No: Power over the environment is shared between Ottawa and the provinces. A permit from one jurisdiction cannot provide immunity to the laws of the other. On the federal side, there is no permit system to avoid s.5.1 of the MBCA at this time. Canada has been considering amendments to allow the “incidental take” of migratory birds by activities not intended to kill those birds. No changes have been made yet so the possibility cannot be used to interpret the existing law. On the provincial side, Syncrude’s permits provide conditions for its activities but not an exemption from all laws of general application. Syncrude has permission to store tailings, but it still must do so in accordance with s.155 of EPEA.

What is the defence?

The defense to strict liability regulatory offenses is due diligence. The Court has suggested that it is available to both charges, though the Crown would argue that that it is not available to the federal charge on account of tailings themselves being an illegal deposit. Where the defence is available, the Court will it will consider: the gravity and likelihood of the harm, the available alternatives, the skill expected of Syncrude and matters beyond its control. It It must conclude that Syncrude took reasonable steps to prevent the unlawful act. This is the major substantive issue in this trial, and one we have heard little from the defendant about.

The Crown has also anticipated that Syncrude will make two rare pleas to escape conviction. One is “officially induced error”, basically being advised to act unlawfully by government itself. How it received erroneous advice and then acted on that advice is unclear, as the case is basically about inaction in the face of known laws. Second is that the matter is “diminimus”, basically too small to be of public interest. This maxim might not even apply to the offence in question, which are about harm prevention rather than moral sanctions. The Federal prosecution has stated that the law must protect against the cumulative effect of environmental harms, which is supported the wording of the MBCA itself.

If Syncrude is convicted can environmentalists prosecute everyone?

No: Charges and prosecution are different. Both acts already allow ordinary citizens to lay charges. Whether these charges get prosecuted remains a policy decision for the Attorney General of the relevant jurisdictio.Basically the Attorney General will consider whether cases are in the public interest and whether a conviction is likely. Therefore a precedent here could increase the likelyhood of future prosecutions proceeding, but other political and administrative policy factors weight in. Private charges are so frequently stayed that the Syncrude case is a rare example of one proceeding. The charges were laid by Jeh Custer of Sierra Club.

Could government be liable?

Possibly: Alberta could be charged under the MBCA as the prohibition extends to anyone who “permits” a deposit. There are no clear precedents due to the discretion of the Attorney General. Proceedings against British Columbia for permitting releases counter to the Federal Fisheries Act were commenced but ultimately stayed. During the Oldman River dam litigation, citizen Martha Kostuch charged Alberta with breach of the Fisheries Act, but again the case was taken over and stayed. Canada could not be liable under the Alberta provision as it is not party to the storage of substances.The larger issue for Canada is whether it can be accountable under the environmental side agreement to NAFTA for not enforcing its own environmental laws.

Will tar sands be illegal?

Not necessarily: Alberta law would still require that animals and tailings come into contact, and that those tailings be hazardous to that animal. Even then, operators could successfully plead due diligence on the facts of their specific case. Whether tailings ponds are illegal under federal law depends on how the judge interprets the MBCA with regards to available defences. Legislative bodies can change statutes at any time and this is already a possibility with respect to the MBCA. Existing authorizations and future permit systems can be amendended to account for the Court’s evolving interpretation of the law. With or without a precedent, enforcement is almost certain to remain discretionary. Both the provincial and federal offences have been available for years but Syncrude will stand as a case of firsts.

Defence arguments are expected on Wednesday May 5th at the Provincial Court of Alberta in St. Albert.

Read it online: http://environmentallawcentre.wordpress.com/2010/04/30/muddy-water-ii-sy...

Oil sands awash in excess pipeline capacity

jessie — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 11:07:13 -0700

Oil sands awash in excess pipeline capacity

Nathan VanderKlippe, Globe and Mail, April 23, 2010, Calgary —In 2008, crude oil prices were flying high. Workers were flocking to Alberta from all over the world to participate in the province’s stellar growth. The industry was expecting to increase annual production by an average of 180,000 barrels a day, an extraordinary 1.8 million barrels a day over the next decade, more than doubling the province’s total production.

But a spreadsheet put together by Mr. Perry told a different story.

For all the Klondike-style rush to the oil sands throughout the 2000s, Alberta had not managed to post a single-year increase of more than 40,000 barrels a day, Mr. Perry found.

Then the financial crisis hit, and oil prices tanked. Mr. Perry had spent three years planning his own pipeline project to Texas, called Altex. But the historical growth figures helped convince him to walk away.

“I finally concluded that, even if no other pipes got built, it’s going to take 10 years to fill my pipeline,” he said. “So basically my pipeline was going to run half empty for five years. It’s a $6-, $7-, $8-billion project. That’s pretty tough economics.”

But other major pipelines, backed by major corporations, went full steam ahead. Despite resurgent oil prices, new production isn’t coming on fast enough to fill up the pipelines. The frenzied construction has left a glut of unused pipeline capacity that will take years to fill.

In a half-year span beginning last fall, TransCanada Corp. and Enbridge Inc. have opened the spigots on two pipelines that, together, have room to carry 885,000 barrels of crude oil a day. Expansion plans call for the two lines, named Keystone and Alberta Clipper, to carry 1.39 million barrels a day in coming years. That will mean new capacity roughly equivalent to the entire current output of the Canadian oil sands.

Too many pipes, not enough product

The aftershocks of that construction will rattle Canada’s oil sands producers, who are already facing soaring transportation tolls. The overbuilding of pipelines has already led to legal wrangling between producers and pipeline operators, and may sour some of those highly dependent relationships.

The pipeline industry argues that it has simply built what producers said they wanted. In fact, TransCanada has sold long-term contracts for the overwhelming bulk of the capacity on its new lines, and industry was so eager for the Enbridge expansion that it made the company agree to financial penalties if it was late in bringing Clipper into service.

Producers, led by Suncor Energy Inc., disagree, arguing Enbridge should have known better than to build unnecessary capacity.

Over all, the pipeline industry says, too much capacity is far better than too little, which can cause a supply glut. In Alberta, a lack of natural gas pipelines severely depressed gas prices in the 1990s, before the Alliance pipeline – which Mr. Perry helped build – was installed. Repeating that experience could be devastating for crude producers.

“Missing the boat and being pipe short has some severe consequences,” said Brenda Kenney, president of the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association. “The key is to look long-term and know that pipe capacity will not be a constraining factor in economic growth.”

But Mr. Perry says a sober look at history could have prevented some of the current predicament.

“Everybody was so enamoured with the supply growth numbers … that they got caught up in it,” he said.

The energy industry’s ambitious growth projections back in 2008 were derailed by a myriad of problems. The economic crisis wreaked havoc on the sector. Projects faltered and timelines were extended. Technical issues, for instance, have so far kept both Husky Energy’s Tucker Lake and Nexen Inc.’s Long Lake oil sands projects far from their original production goals.

Starting in late 2008, fully 1.2 million barrels a day of future projects were deferred or cancelled in the oil sands, as soaring costs and tumbling crude prices scared away investors. The economic recovery has brought some of that work back to life, but even industry projections now show a sobering new reality. According to the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, the volume of oil previously expected by 2011, the first full year of operation for Alberta Clipper, will now not likely flow until 2018 or later.

That seven-year delay could bring wide-ranging pain to the industry. Enbridge has already backpedalled from Texas Access, a pipeline it had intended to build from Illinois to the southern United States, and some worry about whether it will be able to proceed with Northern Gateway, a project intended to deliver oil sands crude to to the Pacific coast.

TransCanada, too, has faced questions over whether it should continue with Keystone XL, a massive pipeline that would carry 510,000 barrels of crude a day to Texas. Enbridge has fought the proposal; Canada’s National Energy Board has approved it.

But even if that’s good news for TransCanada, it’s bad news for those pulling oil out of the ground. The majority of Canada’s crude moves on Enbridge pipelines, which are operated under what’s called a “common carrier” system. That system provides a set rate to move crude, no contracts required. If a producer has oil to ship, they call Enbridge and get access to the line. It’s a great system for newcomers, who can’t get access to already-contracted lines such as TransCanada is building.

The problem comes when there’s a product shortage. Enbridge is entitled to a certain rate of return – regardless of volume. When volume drops, economies of scale work in reverse and thetolls rise. This year, the toll to ship crude from Alberta to Chicago will rise by 97 cents a barrel, a 33-per-cent bump. Analysts warn further bumps are likely when Keystone XL begins accepting crude, expected by 2012. At that time, according to current estimates, pipelines taking crude out of Canada will run 41-per-cent empty.

“I can tell you there are people that think [the toll] could triple,” said Mr. Perry, who is now working with CN Rail on a pipeline-on-rails idea that could help smooth out future demand needs.

Worse, there are worries that pipelines such as Clipper, which service the Midwest, will have trouble achieving their capacity since demand for Canadian heavy oil has come increasingly from the U.S. Gulf Coast.

“There’s probably no question that there will be more exit pipeline capacity leaving Alberta than there is production,” said Russ Girling, president of pipelines and soon to be CEO at TransCanada, which is building Keystone XL specifically to serve the Gulf Coast. “The U.S. Midwest is fairly saturated already with Canadian crude. But there won’t be excess capacity to markets that need the crude.”

Is there a way to avoid a similar situation in future? The industry has its doubts.

“This whole pipeline thing is big judgment, big dollars,” involving complex design and engineering, said Eric Newell, former chief executive officer of Syncrude Canada Ltd. “So it’s not a perfect formula.”

But Jim Carter, the former president of Syncrude, is confident the current problem will be resolved eventually – and that even a substantial increase in tolls, which currently stand at about $3 a barrel, won’t severely hurt oil patch profits.

“At the end of the day, it’s not going to be enough to break the bank,” he said. “People will know that this is a temporary thing until the capacity gets soaked up. And after that, the toll rates will come down.”

Enbridge Pipeline Spill East of Deer River

jessie — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 12:20:55 -0700

Enbridge Pipeline Spill East of Deer River

(Leech Lake Reservation) On Friday, April 16, 2010, a report of an oil spill was called in by local firefighters fighting a forest fire 3 miles East of Deer River, MN, on Leech Lake Reservation property. An unknown amount of crude oil leaked out of a 1-inch crack into a wetland area where the 60 year old pipe is located. The pipelines carry crude oil from the Alberta Canada tar sands through MN to Superior WI.

A 25-acre forest fire was reported on Friday afternoon, the cause of the fire in undetermined at this time. While the fire fighters were fighting the blaze they noticed a black sludge on the ground in a wetland area. Upon further investigation they noticed it was crude oil. The fire was burning along the Enbridge Energy crude oil pipeline. The oil that had leaked out started on fire adding to the fire. Luckily, the firefighters were able to put out the fire.

First picture is a close-up of the exposed pipeline; the outer layer of protection was burnt off during the fire. The second picture is of a portion of the area that is affected. In both pictures are seen the white, diaper-like papers which are used to collect oil out of the wetland waters.

According to the Enbridge Energy Safety Official on the scene today, there are no estimates being released yet on the amount of oil that did leak, but that Enbridge was going to look over their records to try to determine how long the leak may have been there. He also stated that Enbridge Energy didn’t know there was a leak until the fire crews called and notified them. Today workers were placing a temporary sleeve over the crack, but plan to return and replace the 40-foot section of pipe in two weeks.

These kinds of spills, from old and/or exposed pipes in wetland areas, and the apparent lack of sufficient monitoring are among the reasons several Leech Lake Tribal members are taking legal action against Enbridge Energy regarding the “Alberta Clipper Pipeline. Enbridge Energy claims to have state of the art, up to date safety regulations and mechanisms in place and as well as around the clock monitoring of the pipeline pressures to detect leaks immediately, yet leaks like this one can apparently occur for days or more without detection, allowing an unknown amount of oil to leak into vulnerable and sensitive ecosystems and wetlands.

In July, 2009 Leech Lake Member Vikki Howard states” The Leech Lake reservation is 50% water. Water is sacred to all of man-kind, we must protect our water’s from being polluted. It is one of our sacred elements that the Creator has given to us.” The lawsuit also contends that allowing this pipeline to be built through our reservation places “irreparable risks” to our precious water and land base.

“The Indigenous Environmental Network has voiced numerous concerns regarding the stability and safety of these older pipelines. This pipe was put into use in 1949; its now 60 years old, there are places we have seen on the pipeline that are corroded and missing the outer protective layer of asphalt material, right out in the open, exposed in wetland areas. Its very disturbing to see particularly when you consider that there is now a new lease allowing the pipeline to remain in place for another 20 years”, says Marty Cobenais, IEN Pipeline Organizer.

As far as we know, Enbridge has yet to notify the public that this incident occurred.

For more information contact:
Marty Cobenais
Indigenous Environmental Network
martyc@ienearth.org