I touched on the massive oil prospecting and processing operations in Alberta here in February, and here a while back. (For a characteristically articulate and comprehensive overview, you can’t beat Betsy Kolbert’s “New Yorker” article, Unconventional Crude.)
StatoilHydro, the Norwegian state oil and gas company, one of the biggest in the world, has a big stake in the tar sands. Considerable pressure is being brought to bear on StatoilHydro and Norway to divest themselves of their interest. The “Globe and Mail” reported today on Greenpeace’s initiative to get the company to get out. Greenpeace “…calls the oil sands an environmental time bomb that will dramatically speed global warming.” Here is Greenpeace itself on the subject: “…campaign investors are starting to question the wisdom of paying for a project which will destroy an area of forest the size of England, then poison the ground and condemn the world to runaway climate change.” Danske Bank has expressed its opposition to StatoilHydro’s stake and Norway’s largest bank, DnBNOR, is discussing the matter, and also Folksam, a Swedish insurance company and KPA, a Swedish pension fund, are voting for withdrawal at today’s annual meeting. Given the government’s stated support and the fact that they own two-thirds of the company, the vote will go down.
However, the government itself is going to be tested. One of the minority parties, the Christian Democrats, is forcing a vote in parliament. Reuters quotes one of the party’s members: “The most important thing is to put some pressure on the government. If they change their mind it’s a great victory for the environment and for us.” In the article, we further learn that “The move marks an escalation in a row between oil interests and the environment just four months before Norway — the world’s No. 4 oil exporter — holds a parliamentary election.” The “Globe and Mail” article says “Statoil is currently halfway through building its inaugural 20,000-barrel-a-day oil sands plant south of Fort McMurray. The company has bought up land containing two billion barrels of recoverable oil in Alberta, a major chunk of its six billion barrels in worldwide reserves.” Lots at stake.
As I noted in previous posts on the subject, there’s a great honkin’ sword of Damocles hanging over the import of tar sands oil to the US, namely EISA‘s Section 526, which says that for any fuel bought by the federal government “the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions associated with the production and combustion of the fuel supplied under the contract must, on an ongoing basis, be less than or equal to such emissions from the equivalent conventional fuel produced from conventional sources.”
Guess what? Tar sands oil doesn’t come close. Given all the energy inputs – and not counting the destruction of vast swathes of forest that itself enormously exacerbates warming – the lifecycle GHGs are much greater than for conventional fuels. See Report Weighs Fallout of Canada’s Oil Sands from yesterday’s “NY Times” which looks at this major new study from IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates (IHS CERA). The study is meant to highlight the advantages of having this “secure” oil source at America’s doorstep. However, it also says: “…total ‘well-to-wheels’ greenhouse gas emissions from oil sands-from extraction and processing through combustion of its refined products-are approximately 5 to 15 percent higher than the average crude oil processed in the United States. But comparison to an average can be misleading. Emissions from oil sands can be higher, lower, or on par with other crude oils processed in the United States.” Not counting, as I said, the impact of land-use changes. (See this on the extraordinary impacts of land-use changes in the context of biofuel production.)
So what’s the answer for the Canadians on the dilemma of addressing the massive GHG burden of the tar sands: Green Bitumen. What’s that mean? “By utilizing various technologies natural gas can slowly be removed from the fuel mix and replaced with nuclear energy, and gasification. Those facilities that still use natural gas or a synthetic gas derived from coal/coke would begin to adopt Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) as a way to reduce the emissions that belch from the facility with each barrel of bitumen.” My gut reaction? They’re tripping. The folks at CERI have a mission: to promote Canadian energy exports no matter how destructive to the regional environment and to the climate system they may be. I have noted some of the many drawbacks of pursuing both the nuclear power path and the CCS path here a fair number of times. So the proposal to exacerbate the many problems posed by tar sands extraction by seeking to power the operations by nuclear plants and/or to wishfully think that CCS will bury the CO2 and the problem doesn’t really work – for me anyway.
We are on the threshold of an enormous opportunity to restore some balance to the earth, to be, in Ian McHarg‘s prayer, a “benign planetary enzyme.” Some smart lawyers at the Sierra Club, EDF and NRDC might catalyze things by invoking Section 526 and the Norwegian people might just throw out the ruling party over its support for the tar sands.
[Update: The StatoilHydro AGM rejected the proposal, as predicted. All the minutes and press release noted was: “A shareholder proposed that StatoilHydro should withdraw from tar sands activities in Canada. The proposal was not adopted.” Norway’s parliament, the Storting, has delayed its vote. See this from AHN.]
