Tar Sands Pipelines

It has seemed odd to me that the current discussion is only about whether the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline can be built and operated in an "environmentally friendly" way.

It has been my view that, even if it could be built without harming the environment (it can't) and works perfectly (it probably won't), and even if the ships that get filled with and leave port with the crude, unprocessed bitumen and arrive safely at their destination, all is still not well.

If the bitumen is mined and shipped and refined and sold and used as gasoline and diesel fuel, it will lead to more, not less, fossilized and sequestered carbon being put into the atmosphere, and will increase the amount of climate change we will experience.

We are told that 2 degrees of warming might be safe, but that beyond that there are likely to be catastrophic climate changes, including rising sea levels, droughts, major loss of species of all sorts, and other unknown effects.

Here are two links. First is to an opinion piece by Mark Jaccard, a sustainable energy researcher and professor in Simon Fraser University's Resources and Environmental Management department

http://www.vancouversun.com/opinion/op-ed/Pipeline+itself+only+problem+s...

Second is to an opinion piece by Bill Tieleman

http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2012/01/17/Ethical-Oil-My-Gas/?utm_source=dail...