[R-G] Tar sands transform Canada

[Anthony Fenton]

http://www.straight.com/article-167132/tar-sands-transform-canada

October 23, 2008
Tar sands transform Canada
By Charlie Smith

A Calgary author and journalist says most Canadians don’t understand  
that we’re living in a “petrostate” that could undermine our  
democracy. Andrew Nikiforuk, author of Tar Sands: Dirty Oil and the  
Future of a Continent (Greystone Books, $20), told the Georgia  
Straight in a phone interview that Canada needs a national debate on  
the topic. “I think the tar sands has created a political emergency  
for the country,” he said.

In his book, Nikiforuk describes the Alberta tar-sands developments as  
the world’s largest construction project, the world’s largest capital  
project, and the world’s largest energy project—one that uses as much  
water in a year as a city with a population of two million.

“We need reporters from our national daily newspapers living in Fort  
McMurray and writing about this nation-changing event,” Nikiforuk  
said. “This is an event much greater than the building of the national  
railway. This is an event much greater than the Apollo moon project.”

Canada, which has approximately 175 billion barrels of recoverable  
oil, is the largest supplier of oil to the United States, having  
surpassed Saudi Arabia. “We have become a petrostate without any of  
the safeguards that a petrostate should have,” Nikiforuk said.

He noted that there is a vast amount of political-science research  
demonstrating that oil wealth hinders democracy. He said this is true  
regardless of whether the petrostate is in the Middle East, and  
whether it’s a large or small country. Nikiforuk pointed out that  
Canada has ignored recommendations from the International Monetary  
Fund and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development  
calling on countries that generate a great deal of oil wealth to put  
those revenues into a separate fund that cannot be touched by  
politicians.

“Canadians need to start thinking of themselves as a petrostate, and  
they need to start thinking of the kinds of controls needed to protect  
the country from the excesses of oil,” he said. “We also need to think  
about the pace, and where we want to go with it. It is out of control.”

He said that oil wealth undermines democracy in several ways.  
Governments enriched by petroleum revenues reduce taxes, which makes  
the public feel good about politicians who make these decisions. Oil  
money is also used to buy votes, he alleged.

“Then, those parties tend to stay in power for long periods of time,”  
Nikiforuk said, noting that Conservatives have governed Alberta for 37  
years. “Parties that stay in power for long, long periods of time tend  
to become more authoritarian in nature.”

Alberta has the lowest provincial voter turnout in the country.  
Nikiforuk said governments that remain in power for decades tend to  
make more appointments based on patronage rather than merit. “So you  
end up with all kinds of people being appointed to positions they  
should not be in,” he claimed.

He estimated that $200 billion has been spent developing the Alberta  
tar sands if the cost of pipelines, refinery expansions, and upgraders  
is included. “It has brought 700,000 people into Alberta since 1996,”  
Nikiforuk said. “It is almost like the invasion of Iraq, but in this  
case, it’s a petroboom.”

According to the Alberta-based Pembina Institute, two tonnes of the  
bituminous sands, otherwise known as tar sands, and two tonnes of  
overburden must be excavated to create a single barrel of oil.  
Nikiforuk writes that producing each barrel generates three times as  
much greenhouse gas as a barrel of conventional oil because of the  
work involved.

He noted that the tar-sands developments are playing a role in  
preventing Canada from meeting its climate-change goals. But the  
impact goes beyond that, affecting cross-Canada labour mobility and  
causing politicians to amend immigration legislation to allow more  
temporary foreign workers. “The tar sands has changed Canada in the  
same way the fur trade has changed Canada,” Nikiforuk said.

He said that Canadian provincial and federal governments have  
generated $60 billion from tar-sands development, but claimed that  
Canadians have little to show for it. In his book, he notes that  
Ottawa will have collected at least $50 billion from tar-sands  
developments by 2020. “True to the First Law of Petropolitics,”  
Nikiforuk writes, “government has used this windfall so far to reduce  
corporate taxes and slash 2 per cent off the federal sales tax. While  
Norway has kept the resource curse largely at bay with clear  
accounting and its dedicated oil/pension fund, Ottawa has spent the  
cash to win friends and influence elections.”

Nikiforuk said that Canada has no strategy for ensuring self- 
sufficiency in energy over the long term, even though it appears that  
conventional oil production has peaked around the world. He also said  
that no Alberta politician ever expected that environmentally  
concerned Americans would start asking questions about degradation  
wrought by tar-sands developments. “What we’re seeing is a complete  
vacuum here in terms of political direction, political policy,  
political strategy,” he claimed. “It’s dangerous for Alberta. It’s  
dangerous for Canada. It’s dangerous for North America.”

Andrew Nikiforuk will speak on Sunday (October 26) at 7 p.m. at the  
Capilano Performing Arts Theatre (2055 Purcell Way, North Vancouver).  
Tickets are $10/$12.