The Road Not Taken

I may give the impression now and then that I think drilling in sensitive areas like ANWR and the arctic seas are the only threats from oil exploration that the far north faces, but no no. I don't mean that. I don't mean to give that impression at all. There's also that tar sands project in Alberta to consider.

I've mentioned it before, and the oil sands project has been called everything from the worst environmental nightmare ever to the biggest oil boom in North American history. It's probably both. We're talking about an area in northern Alberta, roughly the size of Florida, that is being explored and open-pit mined for bitumen, an extremely messy and low grade source of crude oil. Tar sands have been largely ignored for decades simply because the costs of converting them to refineable crude have been prohibitively high. But that is changing. The mines have been up and running for some time now, and the costs in environmental degradation, social upheaval, and the health of both human and non-human life are on the rise. Fort McMurray, at the heart of the oil sands project is experiencing a boom like few before it. The tailings lakes, euphemistically called ponds, sit in major flyways for migratory waterfowl, and a recent report told of a number of birds that landed in these waters and died as a result, though attempts were made to stuff the report. Fish, wildlife, and native people downstream from these mines are already suffering ill health from toxic wastes.

Dr. John O'Connor was a bush doctor in northern Alberta who would fly in monthly to treat the Athabascan natives downstream from the mines. He would fly in to Fort Chipewyan on Lake Athabasca to treat the natives of the region, and he reported numerous cases of rare and malignant diseases, as well as poisoned and deformed fish that the local fishermen were bringing in. He has since moved to Nova Scotia and has been replaced by a much lower profile doctor, and his findings have been mostly ignored by the Canadian government.

Mining and converting the bitumen into a product that can be refined into a usable synfuel is a dirty process. It requires vast amounts of water, already a shrinking resource, that must be converted to steam to separate the bitumen from the sandstone it is in. Greenhouse emissions from this step alone are currently around 40 million tons of CO2 annually, already beyond Canada's targets under the Kyoto Protocol.

This is all due to change. Under pressure from investors, ExxonMobil has muscled it's way into the project and pushed smaller Canadian firms out, and now is a controlling player in the oil sands. Exxon plans to dump about $124 billion into the project between now and 2012, and plans to build major pipelines to North Dakota, Minnesota, and Ohio refineries to refine the crude into gasoline for our cars. CO2 emissions are expected to rise to around 142 million tons by 2020. There goes the neighborhood, and it's already in the works. In spite of increasing protests and actions, it's all going to happen. Nothing short of drastic action will stop it now, and that's not likely. This, unlike several other arctic drilling propositions, is a major source of oil. It can catapult Canada straight into the ranks of the major oil superpowers, sanity and forward-thinking be damned. An already beleaguered arctic, fragile as it is, will suffer the brunt of it all. It will take ages to recover, if it ever can. The rest of the planet will suffer the consequences.

Industrial humankind has reached that proverbial fork in the road. The easy pickings are over, at least as far as oil is concerned. We can take the high road, that of admitting and overcoming our dependence on oil, and putting our efforts and our resources and our best minds to work on making alternatives like solar and wind a reality. The $124 billion Exxon will sink into the oil sands could go a long way towards that. Or we can go on, business as usual, looking for more and more sources of oil, with little thought of alternatives, little regard for the true costs of burning fossil fuels, and no thought to the consequences of our way of life. Which road are we going to take? I'll give you three guesses, but my guess is that the high road, that of sanity and forward-thinking is the road not taken.

Last Of His Kind?

Thanks to a post over at Billings Blog, I learned this morning that one of my favorite folksingers and storytellers, Utah Phillips, has died. His health had been declining for several years, and he had to cut back on traveling and performing drastically. His music and stories will live forever in my book though. His recording of IWW songs is a classic. Here's one of them:

Here's some words from another fine folk musician, David Rovics. Hat tip to Montana Wobblies.

Let Us Now Praise High Gas Prices

Okay. I'll be the first to say it. Hell, I may be the only one, but so be it. I'm glad to see oil prices climbing to a more realistic level, getting closer to where they should be. Enough of the cheap oil already.

I know, I know -- I bitch and whine too about fishing all those extra dollars out of my wallet whenever I have to stop for gas. I feel the pinch the same as everybody else does. But I still think higher prices are a good thing and are long overdue. Why?

Look at what's been happening recently because of it. Use of public transit is climbing. So is carpooling and vanpooling. Bicycle sales are booming and more and more people are using them to commute and to run errands. Even to travel. Some folks are even getting up on their hind legs and --gasp!-- walking! This is all good.

I'm not saying this just to be contentious and contrary, as fun as that can be. I simply think we need to adapt to some new realities. We need to restructure our societies and economies and work ourselves away from total reliance on oil. Cheap fuel costs do nothing to discourage us from continuing on as we have for decades, and the true costs of that are becoming more and more apparent all the time in public health concerns, environmental destruction, global warming, and in fighting wars for resources. The cost of gas at the pump is one thing. The true cost of reliance on oil is a different beast altogether. Those costs are rising and will continue to do so, and may well be more than we're prepared as humans to pay.

I've heard the economic arguments about rising oil prices. I've heard how lower and middle income people are the ones who are really going to be hammered by higher prices. It's no doubt true. I don't dispute that, and being one of this group myself I don't take what I'm saying here lightly. It is said, and this is already being seen, that high fuel prices will impact and probably disrupt our entire economy. Again, true enough. But given peak oil and the subsequent decline in supply, this will happen anyway, not to mention that a few more environmental tipping points may make the economy the least of our concerns. All the more reason to work on alternatives now. Let's make no mistake -- whatever we do, or don't do, from here on out is going to impact our lives and our economies. We can continue on, business as usual, relying on cheap oil and eventually run off the tracks, or we can constructively work on needed changes and avoid disaster. Maybe we can't avoid considerable discomfort and inconvenience -- even suffering -- but just maybe we can avoid out and out disaster. I'd say higher oil prices are a good start. They may well be the only thing right now, short of actually running out of oil, that will curb our consumption. We can't afford cheap gas any longer.

Lawsuits And Revolving Doors

Lawsuits challenging Interior Secretary Kempthorne's ruling on the status of the polar bear under the ESA are in the works. The Center For Biological Diversity filed court papers on Friday, and Greenpeace and the NRDC filed today. Stay tuned.

Shell Oil Company entered the arena for arctic oil drilling in 2005, and is one of the major forces, if not the major force, in the push to open arctic waters to off-shore drilling this summer. It appears that they have much help from former, and current, members of the Bush administration. Several former Interior appointees are now working for Shell. Says Jeff Ruch of PEER:

“The Bush administration is morphing into a wholly owned subsidiary of Shell,” added Ruch. “The overall impression is that public service was not a calling but a stepping stone for oil company lobbyists.”

Here's a press release and list of some of the names. Like I've mentioned before, this administration is nearing it's end. Look for aggressive action to get these projects running this summer before a new administration steps in that maybe won't be as industry friendly. They're not going to give up. No way in hell are they going to give up. Quite the contrary -- look for them to pull out all the stops over the next few months. Again, stay tuned.

The Polar Bear Seas Protection Act

I guess this whole arctic oil drilling thing has kind of gotten stuck in my craw lately. But it's a big concern. It's a disaster-in-waiting and it's being rammed through as quickly as possible with little regard for the possible consequences.

Oil leases are being sold off as fast as hot dogs at a ball game. Permits to explore are being handed out as fast as the ink can dry on them. Regulations for monitoring and oversight are being scrapped as fast as they can be swept off the table. But why the rush?

Plans for seismic exploration are slated to begin this summer, and the oil companies want nothing more than to get started this summer while they still have a friendly administration ready and willing to open the doors for them. Now, open water season in the arctic can be measured in weeks and the oil industry wants to have all the pieces in place to begin as soon as the waters are ice free. They have plenty of helping hands at Interior. After months of delay, Secretary Kempthorne designated the polar bear as threatened Wednesday. But it's a do-nothing designation that only keeps this administration from being in contempt of federal court for not following an order to do so. But it does nothing to address global warming and the polar bears' shrinking habitat.

Representatives Jay Inslee (D-WA) and Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) introduced a house bill, the Polar Bear Seas Protection Act (HR 6057), designed to plug the glaring loopholes in Kempthorne's designation. It would ensure protection for the bears from oil and gas activity. Senator John Kerry introduced a similar one in the Senate earlier this year. Here's hoping that countermeasures such as these have the teeth and support to stop the oil company giveaways here in the waning months of BushCo's reign. I fervently hope that there are many more challenges to come.

Bears Still Lose

Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne announced yesterday that the polar bear will be given threatened status under the endangered species act. What does this mean?

On the surface it sounds good, but in reality little will change. Plans to drill for oil in arctic waters will continue. Nothing to mitigate global warming will be done. It will be business as usual.

Strictly speaking, Kempthorne and Interior followed the recent order by a federal judge requiring a decision regarding the polar bear be made by May 15. This they did with a totally toothless token designation that, without strong and aggressive policy changes, will do the bear little more good than no decision at all. The real winner here, as expected, is the oil industry. Hopefully challenges to the loopholes in this ruling are forthcoming. I'll be watching.

Update on Arctic leases: Federal agencies have been rubber stamping permits with no requirement for environmental monitoring in order to speed things up for the short open water season. From a PEER news release:

In essence, our federal agencies are saying to the oil companies, 'don’t worry about monitoring what you do, we trust you,' stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch, noting the agencies still lack any capability to determine the effects of seismic and other exploratory activities on threatened wildlife, including the newly listed polar bear. "Standing orders in Alaska are that no permit may be delayed, let alone denied, regardless of the reason".

Great. Just great.

4720 Defeated

The McConnell/Domenici amendment 4720, AKA the 'dirty fuels amendment', was voted down by the Senate yesterday May 13 by a vote of 42-56. This amendment to the flood relief bill would have opened ANWR and sensitive offshore areas to drilling, and would have paved the way for other dirty energy projects. Fortunately cooler heads prevailed. Good show mates.

Here's a press release from the Audubon Society.

Good News

Well, like it or not, here's one of the benefits of skyrocketing gas prices.

On a different front, labor, there's this. The Wobblies, or IWW, are still alive and building here in Montana. Not only that, but they have their own blog. I just happened to stumble across it today, but it's been up for a couple of months or so now. Here it is.

Bears Or Drilling Rigs?

BushCo has been stalling the decision about whether or not to list the polar bear as an endangered species for months now. It was meant to have been decided in January, but it has yet to happen. In the meantime over 440 oil leases have been sold in the arctic to the tune of 2.6 billion dollars. Many of them, if not all of them, are in prime bear habitat.

That's about to change. A couple of weeks ago federal judge Claudia Wilken ordered the Bush administration to make a decision by May 15. The kicker is that an endangered listing for the bear will have a major impact on these leases as well as any future ones. Any bets on how the decision goes? I don't have high hopes for this one. I'm afraid that when word comes down industry will, as usual, prevail. Oil wins.

That Global Warming Thing

I haven't posted much about global warming for quite some time now. It seems kind of pointless at times. Weather patterns are changing -- storms are getting more frequent and severe as in the tornado breakouts over the past few months here in the US. Worldwide drought has reached epic proportions. Arctic ice is melting at a pace that stuns scientists. Yet the denialists firmly plant their heads in the sand and expend great effort to cast doubt on the human role in climate change. Why argue with them, unless of course you enjoy doing so? I sure as hell don't.

There seems to be three distinct camps as far as global warming is concerned. There are the aforementioned head-in-the-sand denialists. There are those who, while they may be unsure one way or the other, choose to curl up in a fetal position and say there's nothing that can be done. We may be responsible, at least in part, for the skyrocketing CO2 counts in the atmosphere but what can we do? Fortunately there are those who will face the problems head on and do their best to mobilize others to act. Guys like James Hansen and Bill McKibben to name but two.

Here's a good piece by McKibben. Read it. Enough said.

Two More Of These

Ah yes, ANWR again. The attempts to open it for drilling just keep on coming, don't they? Those who drool over the thought of handing ANWR over to the oil companies just never give up.

Two bills will likely be up for vote on the Senate floor this coming week. The American Energy Production Act (S2958) will, you guessed it, open ANWR to oil drilling. It could be voted on as early as Tuesday. Ugly.

The Flood Insurance Bill (S2973) will also likely be on the floor. This contains an amendment by McConnell and Domenici (amendment 4720) that would also open ANWR. This amendment to the flood bill would also open the door to other resource extraction such as off-shore drilling in sensitive areas and oil shale/synfuel projects here in the west. Senate Democrats are continuing to filibuster the amendment, Republicans are pushing for a cloture vote. We still have time to tell our senators to vote against both 2958 and McConnell/Domenici amendment 4720.

I get email alerts on these things regularly. I will of course pass them along here. Does anyone read them? Does anyone act? I don't know. Doesn't really matter I guess. I get them in my inbox, post them here, and you choose to either read them or ignore them, act or not -- it's up to you.

Here's one. Here's another. Do what you will.

The Moose

In my wilderness wanderings I've run into quite a few moose. Some pretty close up, some not so close. They are an impressive animal to say the least.

Back when I lived in northern Minnesota I used to spend quite a bit of time at my friend's cabin near the Boundary Waters. Moose country. Now you may be familiar with the eastern moose. While not as large as the Alaskan moose, the eastern moose grows considerably larger than the shiras moose that we have here in the west. A full-grown bull is one mighty creature.

One fall day we hiked in to a small lake a few miles from the cabin. Tom brought a fishing rod along hoping to catch a few trout for dinner. I took his old 12-gauge hoping to find a couple of grouse to go along with them. I left him at the lake and set off along an old abandoned tote road.

I had gone about a half mile or so when I came to a spot where the trail curved around a small thicket of balsam trees. As I came close to the thicket I heard a shuffling sound, and a huge bull moose came around the curve, right on the trail. We saw each other at the same time and we both froze, about ten or twelve feet apart. He was big and in his prime -- each antler palm was probably about three feet long. I just stood there with my mouth hanging open looking up at him, and he stood there looking down his snout and turning his head from side to side, rolling his eyes to look at me. We stood there like that for probably about a minute, which is a very long time indeed when you're literally nose to nose with the largest creature you've ever seen.

I didn't want to annoy him -- I didn't know if the moose were in their rut yet, but I did know that a rutting bull can be quite testy. If he was in a fighting mood I could be in deep, deep shit. I took a couple of slow sideways steps toward the balsam thicket, thinking I could dive into them if I had to. I would have beat myself bloody doing that, but it beat the alternative should he choose to charge. My move satisfied him though. He visibly relaxed and proceeded to move on down the trail right past me. I looked up and watched his right side antler pass nearly over my head, and I could have leaned out and touched him as he passed had I been so foolish. I wasn't. He could have just as easily tilted his head down, hooked me with an antler, and sent me flying into the brush. He didn't. He moved on past me, went a few more yards down the tote road, and turned off and slowly disappeared into the woods. He never looked back. All I could do was collapse onto my knees and let the moment sink in.

I got up and slowly made my way back to where Tom was fishing. When I got there he nodded at the ridge that ran next to the lake and said man oh man, I should have been there a little sooner. He had happened to turn and look behind him while fishing and saw a huge bull moose go up and over the ridge. I looked over at the ridge and just said yeah. I saw him too.

Boot Him Out

The EPA, and it's lead clown Stephen Johnson, have been under much fire lately. There's the matter of interfering with the findings of their scientists to fit BushCo's political agenda. There's the matter of refusing California, and ultimately several other states, the right to regulate their own greenhouse gas emissions. There's the matter of the closing, and limited re-opening of EPA libraries around the country to limit access to critical environmental information. That's just a few examples.

The director of the midwest office of the EPA, Mary Gade, has been pressuring Dow Chemical to clean up their dioxin contamination in Michigan. The dioxin levels around Saginaw, Michigan are almost six times higher than EPA standards allow, and about 65 times higher than Michigan's own stricter standards. Gade hasn't backed down from industry pressure -- in fact she has had her hand on Dow's neck and has been forcing their faces into their mess in order to push them to clean it up. The result? She received word from Johnson, through two aides, that she has been stripped of her power to act and to either resign her position as midwest director by June 1 or get fired. She resigned.

The Friends of the Earth have been active in a campaign to push Stephen Johnson into stepping down as director of the EPA, and the campaign is still going. They are asking for public comment to bring this about. Will it work? Who knows, but it sure won't hurt. Here's what you can do.