The book is a critical expose of the worlds largest energy project the. Andrew nikiforuk is an awardwinning canadian journalist who has been writing about the oil and gas industry for more than two decades. Tar tape archive is a unix utility program to read or write multiple files fromto a single file. Bitumen, the sticky stuff that ancients used to glue the tower of babel together, is the worlds most expensive hydrocarbon. In addition, tarmageddon is written with a wellput together structure, including information written in order from lesser importance to most important ideas. I begin by tracing out how postcold war imaginaries of the tar sands presented the resource as crucial to the future viability of north american democratic. In the long thaw, david archer predicts that if we continue to emit carbon dioxide we may eventually cancel the next ice age and raise the oceans by 50 meters. Dirty oil and the future of a continent lays bare the idiocy of this malignant neglect. Geotechnical and geophysical site characterization 4. Albertas lack of public investment of oil revenue is essentially the opposite of norways planning for the future.
This difficulttofind resource has made canada the numberone supplier of oil to the united states, and every. A proposal for the political economy of green criminology. Early responses to conflict expansion in the oil sands policy subsystem volume 44 issue 3 george hoberg, jeffrey phillips skip to main content accessibility help we use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Comparison of emissions of tar sands and select eu countries, in mt co2eq. Andrew nikiforuk and chris turner prism university of calgary. Ercb letter and tar sands download this response as a pdf the ercb has accused andrew nikiforuk of making a number of factual errors in his book tar sands and has posted a long letter enumerating them on its web site. Dirty oil and the future of a continent ts by andrew nikiforuk. We draw on a range of recent published and unpublished sources. The potency of the toxins in these ponds was revealed to the world when, in the spring of 2008, five hundred ducks landed on a tailings pond maintained by the canadian oil company syncrude, and all five hundred died. Tar sands bitumen is extracted in canada and is transported by pipeline through minnesota and wisconsin and points further south. Bitumen, the sticky stuff that ancients used to glue the tower of babel together, is the worlds most expe. New business councillor volkow page 4 councillor volkow recommended to the committee members a book by andrew nikiforuk entitled tar sands. The ercb has accused andrew nikiforuk of making a number of factual errors in his book tar sands and has posted a long letter enumerating them on its web site. Community economic development simon fraser university.
How the tar sands are fueling the global climate crisis. Tips to resolve the problem encountered with your pdf file. Environmental impacts of oil sands development in alberta. Inevitable extraction, colonial security, and the making. Book exposes the messy conditions of canadas tar sands grist. Dirty oil and the future of a continent by andrew nikiforuk pp. From earthquakes to jessica ernst based on his recent book slick water, a stunning examination of fossil fuel industry and government abuse. Dirty oil and the future of the continent an important book. Hydraulic fracturing, a highly disruptive technology, has been presented as a novel innovation and economic boom. Strategic encounters the petrostate relies on oil as its fiscal foundation, rather than on the taxes paid by the citizens 2009, andrew nikiforuk, tar sands. Cambridge core natural resource and environmental economics climate change, capitalism, and corporations by christopher wright.
Fresh from his provincial election landslide, alberta premier ed stelmach has snagged a more international and dubious title as runnerup fossil fool of the year, beating out several of north americas top. Available research suggests that indigenous communities feel resigned to. The tar sands, arguably the worlds largest energy project, clearly illustrate the troubling nexus between energy and water. Reading data pa driver manual pdf from a pdf file using java. The unrestrained release of greenhouse gases ghgs from the burning of fossil fuels now threatens the political stability of human civilization. In this new edition of his provocative bestseller, andrew nikiforuk assesses recent developments, refutes industrys claim that steam plants are a greener way to extract bitumen, and argues more convincingly than ever. Bitumen, the sticky stuff that ancients used to glue the tower of babel together, is the worldocos most expensive hydrocarbon. This recovery required, and requires, a vision of the region that is long in the making. From wade daviss a light at the edge of the world to david suzukis the sacred balance. To me the environmental, energy, economic trifecta is an extremely tangled web. A humandriven, planetwide thaw has already begun, and will continue to impact earths climate and sea level for hundreds of thousands of years. Tar sands need solid science tar sands need solid science schindler, david 20101124 00. Andrew nikiforuks tar sands and emily carrs klee wyck, and beyond, 40 years.
The tar sands issue, from a wide boundary perspective isnt really about whether we can affordably in energy or environmental terms get 35 million barrels per day of oil, but that we have used up the lions share of the easily available liquid hydrocarbons, and the juice that grew. Yet this outofcontrol megaproject is polluting the air, poisoning the water, and destroying boreal forest at a rate almost too rapid to be imagined. Bitumen, a difficult and dirty hydrocarbon, requires more water for its production and upgrading than conventional light oil. In the service of growing the tar sands, the canadian government gives tax breaks to the worst polluters. However, pdf or portable document format file is one of the highly used file. The sands contain naturally occurring mixtures of sand, clay, water, and a dense and extremely viscous form of petroleum technically referred to as bitumen or colloquially tar due to its similar appearance, odour, and colour. His work has appeared in saturday night, macleans, canadian business, report on business, chatelaine, alberta views, equinox, alternatives journal and canadian family, and in both national newspapers. Now it is a common storage method for bundling and transporting sets of files. Overview of the tar sands of alberta how bitumen is processed. Tar sands and tar sands pipelines can have a major impact on our economy, health and environment.
Tar sands critically examines the frenzied development in the canadian tar sands and the farreaching implications for all of north america. The athabasca oil sands, also known as the athabasca tar sands, are large deposits of bitumen or extremely heavy crude oil, located in northeastern alberta, canada roughly centred on the boomtown of fort mcmurray. Host stephanie potter speaks with andrew nikiforuk, author of tar sands. Pdf unconventional oil is frequently presented as the future of. Here, the z option tells tar to zip the archive as it is created. Portable document format pdf is a document file format originally from adobe, based on postscript. In theory the pdf file format is specified in detail and is very precise. His work has appeared in a variety of canadian publications including the walrus, macleans, canadian business, report on business, chatelaine, georgia straight, equinox and harrowsmith.
Alternatively, if your system does not use gnu tar, but nonetheless does have gzip, you can still create a compressed tar file, via the following command. Andrew nikiforuk tar sands critically examines the frenzied development in the canadian tar sands and the farreaching implications for all of north america. Andrew nikiforuk s nova scotia tour join awardwinning journalist and author andrew nikiforuk for a presentation the legacy of fracking. Applying rock physics tools to reduce interpretation risk. Dirty oil and the future of a continent a couple of years ago, while most canadians were out shovelling the sidewalk or sipping a coffee at tim. These oil sands, hosted primarily in the mcmurray formation, consist of a mixture of crude bitumen a semisolid rocklike form of crude oil, silica sand, clay. The publisher of tar sands, greystone books, believes in the books social importance enough to offer it as a free pdf download through friday. In this hardhitting book, awardwinning journalist andrew nikiforuk exposes the disastrous environmental, social, and political costs of the tar sands and argues forcefully for change. This will also reflect negatively on the writing giving.
The alberta tar sands and jacques elluls theory of technology article pdf available in environmental ethics 371. Bituminous sands, colloquially known as oil sands or tar sands, are a type of unconventional petroleum deposit. As reported on northwest coast energy news, the haisla nation has filed a legal document outlining their opposition to enbridges northern gateway pipeline. Canadian tar sand oil is dirtier and more environmentally destructive than conventional oil.
It takes water to produce energy, and it takes energy to move, pump, and treat water. In 2002, the athabasca tar sands in alberta were reclassified as recoverable. Collapse and revival in a singleindustry community tells of the northern ontario city of elliot lake, once the uranium capital of the world, which was devastated by the closing of the uranium mines operated by denison and rio algom. The sierra club estimated, between 2010 and 2012, northern midwestern pipelines transporting the greatest volumes of tar sands crude spilled 3. Andrew nikiforukwhether nuclear energy presents a legitimate alternative to. Dirty oil and the future of a continent, revised and updated edition. In 1990 the toronto star newspaper awarded him an atkinson fellowship in public. In the lush, sweeping boreal forest in the athabasca valley northeast of edmonton, tension is. The central issue for the haisla nation is their sovereignty over their territory and their right to be properly consulted. Canada now produces more oil than texas or saudi arabia. Originally, this was used to move a whole directory of files tofrom a magnetic tape. It is a key question that both the harper government and enbridge have preferred to ignore in the hopes. In addition tar sands production exerts negative externalities on the region afflicted with construction and operation of tar sands. The unregulated, poorly monitored royalty rates dropped so low that in 20012004 the alberta government actually made more money from video lottery terminals than the tar sands nikiforuk 159.
Hooked on energy dollars, the canadian and alberta governments only make decisions that favor growth of the energy industry, nikiforuk says. Nikiforuk a 2010 tar sands dirty oil and the future of a continent vancouver bc. Andrew nikiforuk is a leading investigative journalist who has written about education, economics, and the environment for the past two decades. Calgary based journalist and author andrew nikiforuk delivers a powerful and revealing presentation based on his book of the same name on what is really going on with the alberta tar sands. Dirty oil and the future of a continent by andrew nikiforuk. By understanding tar sands and tar sands pipelines, we. We find that social science research on oil sands extraction has been inadequate, even as the region has undergone transformation. Nikiforuk and chris turner, two leading albertan environmental writ ers with distinct approaches to. Andrew nikiforuk is a canadian journalist who has won multiple national magazine awards. Dirty oil and the future of a continent, revised and updated edition andrew nikiforuk on. Given that nikiforuks paper has the capability of persuasion, the article has a considerable impact on many individuals who are concerned about the effects of the tar sands. The oil sands can be either a blessing or a curse to alberta, depending on how they are developed. The book is, in essence, a revolting, blushmaking case for canada to develop integrated energy and environmental regulation suitable for the postcarbon age.