Resources and information

Here are some resources for learning more about the various issues related to tar sands and tar shale mining.

Western Resource Advocates site offers this information:

http://westernresourceadvocates.org/blog/us-oil-sands-project-bad-idea-put-on-hold/

Films

Last Rush for the Wild West: Tar Sands, Oil Shale and the American Frontier, exposes how impending tar sands and oil shale mining would destroy massive, pristine landscapes in Utah and put the already imperiled Colorado River watershed at risk. It would jeopardize drinking water quality and quantity for thirty-six million people downstream. It would increase air pollution in Salt Lake City, where air quality is already the worst in the Nation. It would accelerate climate change. The risks to humanity are staggering.
http://www.lastrushforthewildwest.com/

White Water, Black Gold
This film provides a great overview of the human rights and environmental impacts of Alberta’s tar sands mines.
http://www.whitewaterblackgold.com/

Background

BLM, Environmental Impact Statement
http://ostseis.anl.gov./documents/peis2012/vol/OSTS_VOLUME_1.pdf

Canadian Geographic
http://www.canadiangeographic.ca/magazine/jun08/feature_tar_sands3.asp

Oil Shale and Tar Sands Programmatic EIS: Overview of the tar sands extraction process
http://ostseis.anl.gov/guide/tarsands/index.cfm

Emissions and Climate

Department of Energy, Office of Petroleum Resources
http://www.fossil.energy.gov/programs/reserves/npr/Tar_Sands_Fact_Sheet.pdf

NRDC: Dirty Fuels
http://www.nrdc.org/energy/dirtyfuels.pdf

Pollution and Health

Alberta Health Services, Cancer Rate in Fort Chipewyan, Alberta
http://www.albertahealthservices.ca/rls/ne-rls-2009-02-06-fort-chipewyan-study.pdf

Physicians for a Healthy Environment
http://www.energy.utah.gov/government/strategic_plan/docs/publiccomments/uphe10152010.pdf

Science Daily, “Untold Levels of Oil Sands Pollution On Athabasca River Confirmed.”
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091207151335.htm

Water Consumption

RAND Study
http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG414.html

U.S. Government Accountability Office—Water Use Study
http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-35

University of Utah Institute for Clean and Secure Water
http://www.netl.doe.gov/technologies/oil-gas/publications/EPreports/FE0001243_TOR_23110_4.pdf

Economy and Jobs

Cornell University, Global Labor Institute
http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/globallaborinstitute/research/upload/Impact-of-Tar-Sands-Spills-on-Employment-and-the-Economy-summary.pdf

A funny article about the name we choose/use

https://thetyee.ca/News/2011/04/25/TarVsOil/

‘Tar Sands’ vs. ‘Oil Sands’ Political Flap Misguided?

What to call Alberta’s reserves is raising a fuss, but for wrong reason, research indicates.

By Geoff Dembicki 25 Apr 2011

image atom — Tell people this is oil sand and odds are they’ll like it less than tar sand.

The debate over whether to use “oil sands” versus “tar sands” is about way more than terminology. And never has that been more obvious than during the current federal election.

Just last week, the Calgary Herald ran an editorial lambasting NDP leader Jack Layton for the word choice he made in week one of the campaign.

‘TAR SAND’ IS NO NEW ENVIRO TERM

The term tar sands was more widely used than oil sands to describe Alberta’s bitumen fields until the 1960s, when the provincial government made it a formal policy to call it oil sands.

Today, the Schlumberger Oilfield Glossary defines “tar sand” this way:

“A sand body that contains heavy hydrocarbon residues such as tar or asphalt, or degraded oil that has lost its volatile components. Hydrocarbons can be liberated from tar sands by heating and other processes, but tar sands, such as the Athabasca tar sands of Canada, are not commonly commercial because of high costs of production.

“Among some workers in the field of heavy oil, this term is falling out of use, in favor of the term ‘oil sand.'”

The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers website describes the term tar sands as a “colloquialism” and oil sands as “an accurate term.” However the same CAPP site notes interchangeable usage over 70 years ago:

“The University of Alberta’s library has a scanned copy of The History of Alberta Oil that quotes the December 1939 issue of The Pre-Cambrian:

“‘The tar sands, or more properly the oil sands, of the McMurray area constitute probably the largest potential oil field in the world, and it has been the dream of many oil technologists to find an efficient and economic process of separating the oil from the sand in such a condition that it will be readily processed in a modern refinery into gasoline, diesel and fuel oil, and road oils…” — Mr. L. C. Drummond, Secretary-Manager of the Alberta and North-West Chamber of Mines. Source: Peel’s Prairie Provinces; University of Alberta Library.

What’s The Tyee’s policy on tar sands vs. oil sands? Agnostic. “I publish whichever term the writer chooses, no questions asked. We’re not the Spanish Inquisition here,” explains editor David Beers.

He’d said “tar sands” during a stop in Quebec — a term the Herald claimed has “become part of the rhetoric of extremists who are anti-oil.”

Anyone involved in the battle over Alberta’s unconventional oil industry knows each term represents a distinct political position.

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Utah Tar Sands Resistance

Exposing the lies about tar sands and oil shale strip mining in Eastern Utah

Resources and information

‘Tar Sands’ vs. ‘Oil Sands’ Political Flap Misguided?

What to call Alberta’s reserves is raising a fuss, but for wrong reason, research indicates.