andyt andyt:
I was listening to cross country checkup talk about the Energy East project. A woman from North Bay phoned in to say the line runs right underneath the water supply for the town, and if there was a spill, the town would be farked.
Let's discount the no pipelines because no oil sands because global warming crowd right away. No point arguing about that.
What I don't hear from the Alberta contingent on CKA much, is concern about the environment and the possible dangers of pipes and tankers, not just to the environment, but to people's lives. Might not do you much good to have a job from the oil business if you can't live in your town because the water is farked up.
We know how big oil operates. A certain CKA member who likes to rave how people hate Alberta, also raved on about how the Gulf of Mexico spill was caused by BP being to cheap to install a 1 million dollar check valve. Well that thinking goes right thru the oil business, it's not just BP, any oil or pipeline or tanker ship company is going to try to save a buck where ever they can. What worries people near any pipes is the example of the Enbridge spill at Kalamazoo, and the debacle that followed. Yet they want to build pipe thru BC, with that same mindset.
I don't expect any different from business - that's their job, to maximize profit. But it's up to government to set very strict standards for these projects, and then to monitor and enforce those standards. Including sufficient insurance on the part of the companies. This is where the previous govt fell down. They were just cheerleaders for any pipe, anywhere, any time. They eliminated the Kits Point Coast Guard base which allowed the Marathasa spill to be as bad as it was. And the spill response crew that was supposed to man the Richmond base was up in Prince Rupert, for whatever reason.
That spill is what turned me against the Transmountain project. I figured the pipe route was already in place, they were already shipping some dilbit out of the harbor, what could go wrong? Well we saw what could go wrong, unless a govt is in place that actually gets it, that isn't just a cheerleader for the oil industry, .
So the pro-pipe people need to get their heads around the environmental dangers of the projects and the huge costs ignoring those dangers would bring. Whether it's economical to have these projects, with very stringent safety conditions, I don't know. I know if those conditions aren't in place, we could be well and truly farked.
One of the biggest problems in the pipeline discussion IMHO is the automatic assumption that every leak from any pipeline is going to be a catastrophic one, when most of them are pretty small and contained quickly.
The fact is that those massive spills are the exception, not the rule, but opponents - be they FN, environmentalists or just NIMBY people, automatically go to that argument right off the bat.
You yourself did it by mentioning Kalamazoo and insinuating that expanding TransMountain would led to one, even though there hasn't been a big one from TM in the more than 50 years its been operating.
Take a look for example at TM's marine spill history:
$1:
Since 1956, vessels from our Westridge Marine Terminal have been transporting petroleum products safely through Port Metro Vancouver without a single spill from a tanker.
http://www.transmountain.com/spill-historyAnd yet, for some reason, your biggest fear is something that has NEVER happened in 60 years of operation.
Further, most spills, when they do happen, are relatively small and easily dealt with. Here's TM's pipeline spill history:
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The remaining 30.5% of Trans Mountain’s spills have occurred along the pipeline, with 21 incidents related to releases of crude oil from the pipeline. Of these spills, only nine exceeded the reporting threshold of 1.5 m3 — with just three of those nine occurring in the last 35 years. In all of these circumstances, Trans Mountain deployed its emergency response and spill management procedures.
http://www.transmountain.com/spill-historyThe other really inconvenient truth is that most pipelines run most of the time without a leak or a spill. Even if you take every barrel spilled in a giant spill like Kalamazoo, it's a trickle compared to what actually flowed through the pipe in its lifetime.
To me, it's roughly the same as deciding not to ever drive a car again because you got in an accident once.
At the end of the day though, logic NEVER defeats emotion - and if someone is dead set against pipelines for whatever reason (climate change, economic benefits, location, whatever), no amount of evidence will ever change their minds.
Having said that, that is why an organization like the NEB exists - to remove emotion from the equation and look at facts and only facts for the pipeline in question.
Going forward, my question is how much of Trudeau's changes to the regulatory process will hamper/assist the future development of pipelines in this country.
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