"Chinese takeover is good news for Alberta"

says Alberta Energy spokesman Tim Markle.

PetroChina, the world's second largest oil company, is buying a 60% majority stake in two Athabasca Oil Sands Corp tar sands projects. The $1.9 billion deal will provide Chinese capital for Athabasca which controls about 1.3 million acres of oil sands properties containing as many as five billion barrels of reserves in Alberta. The deal is slated to go through on Oct 31.

"Sveinung Svarte, chief executive of Athabasca, said the company would likely ship its initial output to U.S. refiners, but would consider other export routes if they open up."

In 2005 the state-owned PetroChina signed a memorandum with Enbridge to take up to half the space on its proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline from Alberta to the port of Kitimat in BC.
Enbridge is applying to build the pipeline this year, so presumably PetroChina will eventually be able to ship its newly acquired share of Alberta oilsands straight home to China.

Athabasca does not foresee any "issues" from Investment Canada.
Oilweek :

"Such a takeover would be subject to a new provision recently incorporated into the Investment Canada Act, under which the federal government could block a deal from a foreign firm if it was deemed to pose a threat to national security. But Ottawa will likely wave through the deal.

Geopolitics Central economist Vince Lauerman : ""Given the environmental factor down in the states, it only makes sense to diversify our customers, especially to customers that are somewhat less concerned about the environment in general and greenhouse gas emissions in particular."

The Chinese takeover is good news for Alberta, said Alberta Energy spokesman Tim Markle."

Yup. Just in case this :
August 2009 : Washington approves oil sands pipeline

"The Obama administration yesterday approved [an Enbridge] pipeline to carry oil-sands fuel from Canada into the US, saying its action was designed to send "a positive economic signal in a difficult economic period".

reverts back to this :
June 2008 : Obama's fight against 'dirty oil' could hurt oil sands

"Barack Obama on Tuesday vowed he would break America's addiction to "dirty, dwindling, and dangerously expensive" oil if he is elected U.S. president -- and one of his first targets might well be Canada's oil sands."

Good to know the Cons' criticism of China's crappy environment record - their stated reason for blowing off the Kyoto Accord - isn't likely to stand in the way of selling China the product of our own crappy environment record.

How the US will react to this possible threat to 'North American energy security' is anybody's guess.
.
Related : Laila Yuile : Support divided for Enbridge Northern Pipeline
The Tyee : Environmental groups demand public inquiry into Enbridge Pipeline
.

Canada and torture : Getting around our own principles

From "A History of Hypocrisy" by Regan Boychuk, in the Literary Review of Canada :

"To judge by the statements of government officials, Canada is—as it should be—staunchly opposed to torture. Just over two decades ago, Canada became one of the first countries to ratify the United Nations Convention against Torture, adopting an absolute ban on “any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person.”

In the 1980s, Canada was instrumental in creating and supporting the UN Working Group on Involuntary Disappearances, and in 2007 the Canadian delegate to the UN Human Rights Council reaffirmed that those responsible for enforced disappearances should not go unpunished. Nonetheless, as Human Rights Watch reported in 2006, Canada also worked aggressively to dilute key provisions of an international treaty on forced disappearances:

"To their disgrace, the United States and Russia strongly opposed the [treaty] effort, not least because each had begun using forced disappearances itself …Canada contributed to this shameful opposition, not because it is known to forcibly "disappear" people, but apparently because Prime Minister Martin, eager to improve relations with the United States that had been strained under his predecessor, decided to run interference for one of his neighbor’s unsavory practices."

Despite the efforts of the U.S. and Canada, the text of the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance—modelled after the UN Convention against Torture—was approved by the General Assembly in December 2006. Seventy-two countries have since signed it, neither the U.S. nor Canada among them. "

Mr. Boychuk then cites the 74 CIA flights made through Canada since 9/11 and Foreign Affairs department spokesman Rodney Moore's 2006 statement that "whether any particular rendition is lawful would depend on the facts of each individual case".

A depressingly familiar Canadian refrain, this public purporting to support progressive principles on the international stage while working secretly behind the scenes to prop up regressive American interests conflated with our own.
More recent examples include our non-commitment commitment to Kyoto and our backroom watering down of the provisions against the use and manufacture of clusterbombs.


Professor Barry Cooper, friend to PM Harper, Senior Fellow at The Fraser Institute, and creator of a slush fund at the University of Calgary which accepted monies from Alberta oil and gas companies to help finance Tim Ball and his anti-Kyoto Friends of Science group, doesn't much care for Mr. Boychuk's essay on Canadian complicity in the history of torture.
After dismissing it as "smug, and wholly predictable, anti-Americanism", Prof. Cooper complains,

"In contrast, one might consider the [ancient] Greeks"

- no, I'm not kidding! that's what he said! - and complains that :

"Mr. Boychuk accepts the sentimental definition of the United Nations, namely inflicting severe pain or suffering."

Yes, do let's look at something else entirely, Prof. Cooper.
Asshat.
If we cannot accept that we have been both complicit and blind to that complicity, we will never learn how to stand on our principles.

Cross-posted at Creekside

CUJO goes to Bali

At Kyoto talks in Bali during which China is talking for the first time about "commitments", the new Canada, US, and Japan org, henceforth to be known as CUJO for short, could certainly use a little branding help to clarify their crappy bad boys spoilers rep on the world stage. And a dangerous rabid dog seems about right.

"In the most contentious move of the conference so far, Japan insisted it is “essential” for the world to “move beyond the Kyoto Protocol.” Just a few minutes later, in what appeared to be a prearranged move, Canada threw its weight behind the Japanese position, lending crucial support to Washington's refusal to sign the Kyoto treaty."

U.S.: the next climate agreement must be “economically sustainable” and must promote economic growth for people and nations “everywhere.”
Japan : there must be “compatibility” between environmental protection and economic growth.
Canada : there must be a “balance” between the environment and “economic prosperity.”

Synchronicity!
None of the three mentioned binding commitments or mandatory targets for reducing greenhouse gases or short-term targets for an agreement to replace Kyoto when it expires in 2012.
And yet, most amusingly, despite Canada's assertion that there must be a 'balance' between the environment and 'economic prosperity', the G&M reports that "Canada is not sending any ministers to the meetings of trade and finance ministers at Bali."
Apparently although we place the highest priority on an economically sustainable environment treaty, somehow we just don't feel like talking about it to anyone else right now.

Hopefully The Yes Men will yet make an appearance on our behalf.

Cross-posted at Creekside

Baird demonstrates a willingness to listen. Then plugs his ears.

Well, this isn't surprizing.

Environment Minister John Baird says the Conservative government won't dismiss a newly passed law requiring Canada to respect its emissions-cutting commitments under the Kyoto Protocol.

But he says he's not putting forward a new environment plan either. Baird says the time for studying and developing new plans is over, and that the government is already moving on a "realistic" plan to tackle climate change.

Studying and developing?!

He says the government will follow through with the "technical letter" of the bill, but won't waste another six months studying the issue and commissioning more reports.

Six months? Is he trying to tell us the Conservative plan took six months? What happened? Did the package they opened at cabinet come without a green crayon?

Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said his government's climate plan will curb greenhouse gases by 20 per cent by 2020, although three studies have debunked the plan since Baird released it in April.

But if Steve says it's so, then it must be so... right?

That's what I thought