By Ryan Maue.
Free publicity:
Bill McKibben’s Call to Action: “I want to tell you about an upcoming action — it looks set to turn into the biggest civil disobedience protest in the history of the North American climate movement. It will take place at the White House from August 20-Sept. 3, and we need your help spreading the word. But I want to explain the reasoning behind it in some detail, because for me it helps illustrate how some of the debate about Obama is unproductive.”
President Obama has recently been criticized by former VP Al Gore in his rambling Rolling Stone article. But apparently that’s been “unproductive” and some damage control is in order. McKibben has the perfect solution in order to lobby the President to kill the Keystone Pipeline: “We asked people who had Obama buttons in their closets to bring them and wear them — many of us still remember the shivers that ran down our spines when he said, on the eve of his nomination, that with his election “the rise of the oceans would begin to slow and the planet begin to heal.”
The opposition to the Keystone Pipeline is not terribly difficult to figure out. But McKibben deftly summarizes the ultimate stakes that liberal environmentalists face:
But there’s a bigger problem here too. Those Alberta tar sands are the biggest carbon bomb on the continent — indeed, on the whole planet, only Saudi Arabia’s oil deposits are bigger…if you could burn all that oil at once, you’d add 200 parts per million co2 to the atmosphere, and send the planet’s temperature skyrocketing upwards. Any serious exploitation of the tar sands, says Hansen, means it’s “essentially game over” for the climate. So, high stakes. And don’t think that the Canadians will automatically find some other route to send their oil out to, say, China. Native tribes are doing a great job of blocking a proposed pipe to the Pacific; Alberta’s energy minister said recently that he stays up nights worrying that without Keystone his province will be ‘landlocked in bitumen.’ Without the pipeline, said the business pages of Canada’s biggest paper, Alberta oil faces a ‘choke point.’
So, the Call to Action is summarized on a website, where you can go to sign up to join the effort: Tar Sands Action
Get your best business attire, your Obama buttons, and get ready to join Danny Glover, Naomi Klein, and NASA scientist James Hansen at the White House, and help Obama “get his environmental mojo back!”
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From a political point of view, with gas prices soaring and the President in complete reelection/campaign mode, blocking the pipeline would be a huge political gift to any GOP nominee.
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I often wonder if “Ole Crazy Eyes” McKibben ever gives thanks to the veteran’s that have sacrificed so much to protect his right to attempt “mobocratic rule”?
Midwest Mark says:
July 12, 2011 at 5:35 am
“Coldfinger is exactly right–activism and protest is a necessity–a way of life–for these folks. If all fossil fuels were banned…if carbon was finally declared illegal…they would find a new agenda; a new idol to worship.”
It’s called the “Messianic Kommissarr Complex.” It causes extreme agitation in those who suffer from it and live in a country that has no official positions for Kommissarrs.
So, August 20 – September 3 is two weeks. Is Hanson using vacation time? Surely he’s not on NASA’s time?
Countdown to $100 oil – a date with history?
These alarmists will directly harm YOUR income!
What are YOU going to do about it?
So, what about the oil that was recently released from the strategic petroleum reserve by the Obama administration? Doesn’t that oil release CO2 when it’s burned as well? Why no protest over that?
If you want to kill that mastodon, it will be 10 sea shells.
If you want the drought to end, it will be five chickens.
If you want more rain and warmer, throw a virgin in the fire……
…..there have always been people that believe this crap
That’s why there’s so much money in it…………….
GK: “The Canadian/Albertan tar sands paradigm presently doesn’t make logical sense, when using natural gas for the heat/steam generation. This must be upgraded to nuclear power, which is the configuration that makes more ANY sense. ”
NG is really, really cheap. And Canada has vast quantities of it. Nuclear is really, really expensive. And Oil is worth a lot of money.
I heard 1 billion cu ft of NG per day = 1,000,000 X 1000/cu.ft to produce 2,000,000 bbl/day
Gas is around 4$ per 1000cu.ft.
4 million dollars in NG per day to produce 200 million worth of oil.
2%
Much better that they buy their oil from all of those “friendly” dictatorships, for sure….
Fracking for Shale Gas and climate is over: see the lobbying at the European scale…
Oil sands exploitation and climate is over…
If we find anything else that does not reward the carbototalitarians, climate will be over and this source of energy will be vilified…
In Canada, the organ of green propaganda The Thomson Reuters Globe and Mail is featuring this McKibben and some TD bank economist to tell us “Canadians should not take electricity for granted”… sounds like UK’s Holliday’s statement…
It’s seasonal as soon as temperatures in Toronto are over 30C… Global warming advocacy…
DCA says:
July 12, 2011 at 7:23 am
A double standard is applied here. There are lots of peer reviewed journal articles on global warming or whatever you want to call it. That fact is then used to support the outrageous claims of global warming activists that we (the world?) must undertake extreme mitigation strategies (Great Depression producing strategies) now to save the lives of billions of people in the next twenty years or so.
Does anyone actually believe that the peer reviewed journal articles contain the outrageous claim of the Warmista? Claims that imply it? Of course not!
See the double standard. The peer reviewed journal articles are cited as evidence for an outrageous claim that they do not contain.
Try the experiment of finding just those peer reviewed journal articles that contain the outrageous claim. You will be able to count them on your fingers.
“[…] if you could burn all that oil at once […]”
If my granny had wheels, she’d be a wagon.
===============================================
@Ken Harvey says:
July 12, 2011 at 4:03 am
(also commenting re burning all that oil all at once)
“Gee. Where do I apply for an admission ticket?”
LOL! (And you would not believe how far back the first row seats are!)
Notice that Danny Glover, in opposing this project is directly benefiting Hugo Chavez who most stands to benifit if the pipeline is not built. Hugo frequently drops Danny’s name when justifying justify his dictatorship in Venezuela. Danny and Sean Penn are Hugo’s favorite “usefull idiots”.
Picture Danny on Hugo’s knee and Chavez’s lips not moving when you listen to Glover.
HOw do they manage to keep Hansen? He’s definitely not doing his job if he’s out spreading hate and fear most of the time. I bet this is not part of his job description, although, as they obviously allow his behavior, they clearly do not mind it.
He’s nothing but A GOVERNMENT PAID HACK for the global warming scam. I am all for free speech but he is breaking the law by perpetuating a scam and a con job.
It is not the goal of worldwide socialism, it is totalitarianism, and it is coming from the right and the left. The most effective way to accomplish this is to get the masses of liberal and conservative sheep fighting among themselves. Extreme right and extreme left are the alpha and the omega, or endpoint, of the circular path towards totalitarianism.
Ah, Bill “Crazy Eyes” McKibben. Always a favorite.
Here in Alberta, we the ordinary people don’t really give a damn of those clueless eco-zealots down in the United States. They’re just a distraction. China and India, along with other developing (make that ‘surging’) markets, will be more than happy to get their oil in the coming decades from one of the friendliest, dependable, and environmentally-responsible and realistic places on Earth. Thank you.
Why glorify this sideshow by calling it “civil disobedience?” It is nothing of the sort. It’s a street demonstration by a few crackpots that is designed to trigger press reports. No doubt it will, because the media are wacko, too.
This infuriates me! I work in the OIL SANDS! Tar, Hansen, is a MAN MADE substance modified from pitch (resin) produced primarily from the wood and roots of pine by destructive distillation under pyrolysis. Like everything else Hansen touches and has no clue about – including climate, sea level, etc., he has no clue about oil sands. And yes, Hansen, the oil sands are the single largest NATURAL oil spill in history produced by nature itself. We are cleaning it up and selling said oil which is in the soil. That was there long before white man and AGW fanatics were ever born or set foot in North America.
I challenge Hansen or any other eco-nut to visit and see for him or themselves oil leeching into the rivers in this region from natural run off from rain/snow/blowing sand. Oil leeching up from underground in our rivers every minute of ever day for millions of years. We have 58 air quality monitoring 24/7/365 throughout the region and our air is far better than any in any city in the world. Our carbon footprint is the exact same as in the California heavy oil industry. All the oil sands companies together have planted 25 million trees and growing. Our total working area for all oil sands projects is smaller than the City Of Edmonton, Alberta, a city of 1.5 million people. We have more than 100 water monitoring quality stations in this area.
The Keystone Pipeline is there for American if THEY wish to buy our oil. We do NOT force Americans to use our oil – they do so because of their need. Just refuse the Keystone Pipeline and we’ll pipe to the west coast and sell to China. And YES China is NOW here in the oil sands in a massive way with money and paying billions for oil sands companies – while America on our doorstep sleeps. What is wrong with this picture? While America can choose to be held captive to Middle East oil as America is at this point in time. We already ship 2+ million barrels a day of Alberta crude south of the border. 14 other nations have bought into the oil sands – believe me we have all the customers we need and then some.
@ur momisugly HaroldW says:
July 12, 2011 at 3:25 am
Harold, calculations might be ok … but your 175B barrels starting point is probably wrong … do these “proved reserves” include the tar sands ? …
I’m no specialist, but according to Wikipedia, the “Oil sands may represent as much as two-thirds of the world’s total “liquid” hydrocarbon resource, with at least 1.7 trillion barrels (270×10E9 m3) in the Canadian Athabasca Oil Sands (assuming a 10% recovery)” … ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_sands. )
McKibben is most probably no mathematical genius (none of them are …), but in this, the order of magnitude is probably more his than yours …
🙂
I certainly hope that during the biggest civil disobedience protest in the history of the North American climate movement, no-one would be so disobedient as to get themselves arrested.
Oh! I see that NASA scientist James Hansen is attending. I hope his holiday pass has been signed off.
DCA – stick around, the authors, themselves, agreed that there were only @77 (IIRC) suitable respondents from the thousands polled. 70ish. Pared down democracy in action 😉
Also, as Theo says, there are no peer-reviewed papers providing any evidence that mankind’s additional CO2 caused any warming. If there were a silver bullet on either side of this “debate” the losers would be quietly sulking and the victors crowing loudly.
Mingy says:
July 12, 2011 at 6:04 am
“A Canuck here.
I actually hope they block the pipeline and ban the purchase of ‘dirty oil’ by the US.
That way, we’ll build a pipeline westward and sell all the oil we can make to the Chinese.”
yes, Canada should do that anyway….if you get a crooked gov’t like the current one down here, who knows what they’ll try(threats?) to get Canada to lower the price of that oil(our current crop of pols will do anything to stay in power)….always helps to have a second outlet for a truly free mkt…
Ha Ha Ha!
I hope these “Civil Disobedience” types find out what “Executive Privilege” is all about.
I completely disdain B.O. However, he has as much RIGHT to Presidential Security as any Rep. Pres, or any other President had.
Hope he has to use it.
Marvelous irony.
Max
Lets get some real facts on the table. Canada pumps out 0.02% of the total CO2 on the planet. That is Canada in its entirety. The oil sands pump out 5% of 2% of Canadian CO2 – that amounts to 0.001. In comparison – Power generation 16% of 2%, Transportation 27% of 2%, All other 52% of 2%.
Let’s look at deforestation next. Alberta oil sands (over 40 years): 602 square k. Replanted 25 million trees. Now home to bison, deer, moose, fox, etc., etc.,
Quebec – James Bay Hydro project, the eco-fanatics “green” treasure – 9,700 sq.k. Which project killed more environment? Which project killed an entire river system, it’s fish migratory patterns, drowned more land, changed an entire eco system? And at the end of the day have the same CO2 output?
The TransCanada pipeline currently ships half a million barrels a day to the US. The Keystone expansion would increase this by another half million. In 2008, the last year statistics are available, Canada was shipping 1.5 billion barrels per day to the US.
The comments about “dirty oil” are laughable. How do these activists know what percentage of the pipeline oil is dirty oil from the tar sands? Furthermore, how do they know how much of this oil is the dirtiest dirty oil, comprising the 20% of total tar sands production that is extracted from open pit mining? Wouldn’t the dirty oil contaminate the “clean oil?” It seems the American public would be encouraged to cut off Canada’s oil supply all together, lest they be accused of hypocrisy.
As an Albertan, I would be happy with keeping all of our oil. It makes more sense to me that we sell a small percentage of it and save the rest for when it is really needed. Our provincial government has not operated in our best interests. They have opened the door for oil and gas exploration without the most beneficial system of pay back to Albertans and by extension all Canadians. Our federal government owns surface land rights, therefore the public is powerless to stop the infiltration of oil and gas development. The industry creates jobs and brings wealth to our government, but all at a cost to the people who live here. Meanwhile, the majority of Alberta oil is getting shipped south of the border.
The activists quoted in this article decry the environmental impact of the Keystone pipeline. They should take a look at the province of Alberta. It is a patchwork of pipelines covered by a rash of gas wells. Many oil and gas companies building gas wells in our backyards or crossing them with pipelines are American companies. Production in the Alberta oil sands is now dominated by foreign companies. It was the American goverment who recently petitioned for a fivefold increase in dirty oil sands production.
A study of NAFTA shows that in the event of a national emergency, the American government can usurp Canadians access to our own natural resources. Thus, it can be argued that Americans own the pipeline not Canadians. Secretary of State Clinton understands this which is no doubt why she supports extension of the pipeline to double its capacity. All the activists’ can hope to accomplish is delaying the inevitable. Although, I really do wish them success.