Keystone | Northwest Coast Energy News

Oliver in media blitz hinting at pushing Northern Gateway in case US stops Keystone XL

Energy Environment Politics

Canada’s minister of natural resources, Joe Oliver, has embarked on a media blitz, quietly pushing the idea that

Canada will go ahead and build the Northern Gateway pipeline to send bitumen sands to Asia if the United States blocks the Keystone XL pipeline from Alberta to Texas.

In a meeting with The Globe and Mail editorial board on Friday, and an interview with Reuters Monday, while attending the World Energy Council in Houston, Texas, Oliver warns the American that if they don’t buy bitumen sands oil, China will.

Speaking with the Globe and Mail editorial board Oliver said:

that he does not make this point to U.S. officials “unless they ask,” but “if they don’t want our oil….it is obvious we are going to export it elsewhere.”

China could be a key customer in the future, he said. “As a broad strategic objective we have to diversify our customer base…..[and] China has emerged as the largest consumer of energy in the world, so it is utterly obvious what we must do.

Speaking with Reuters, Oliver made similar statements

What will happen if there wasn’t approval — and we think there will be — is that we’ll simply have to intensify our efforts to sell the oil elsewhere,”

“It may be other parts of the United States, it may be a rerouted pipeline, and then, of course, there’s Asia.”

The Globe and Mail also reported that:

Mr. Oliver did not specifically endorse the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline, which would carry oil sands petroleum to the west coast, where it would be transported to Asia by tanker, saying he will respect the regulatory process that is now evaluating that project.

Reuters also says Oliver did not specifically endorse Northern Gateway in that interview.

Which means that Oliver has changed his tune a bit since becoming minister, since in the past he has been openly supportive of Northern Gateway “in the national interest” months before the Joint Review hearings on the pipeline are even due to begin.

In the Reuters interview, Oliver, apparently determined to promote energy from the oil sands, for the first time apparently, hinted that a bitumen pipeline might head somewhere to the east.

“What we want to do in respect to Asia, that objective is not mutually exclusive with the Keystone pipeline. We have a lot of oil and we want to get it to welcoming markets and open markets,” Oliver said.

“And there are also possibilities of moving it east as well. We just have to look at the whole picture. But there would be a delay, and that wouldn’t be positive for either country in our view,” he said.

Oliver also told The Globe and Mail he does not use the “ethical oil,” agrument in talks with the United States, instead emphasizing that Canada is a reliable producer. Oliver also continued his criticism of the EUropean union for an initiative that would label crude from the oil sands as dirtier than fuel from conventional sources.
Oliver told the Globe that the European Commission’s proposed fuel quality directive is “discriminatory” and not based on science.

In a news release, summarizing Oliver’s speech in Houston, the Ministry of Natural Resources quoted Oliver this way:

“Canada’s vast energy endowments of oil, gas, hydro and uranium, along with an innovative clean energy sector, provide us with a unique advantage — one that strengthens our role as a safe and secure global energy supplier….

“We welcome international investment because it is good for our economy, for our jobs and for our energy future.”

Minister Oliver reaffirmed the Government of Canada’s commitment to ensuring the environmentally and socially responsible development of the oil sands, a strategic resource that is critically important to Canada and its energy partners. He noted Canada’s energy policy is rooted in free market principles, coupled with a regulatory regime that is “efficient, transparent and effective.”

“Canada is a responsible and reliable partner in achieving a secure and sustainable global energy supply. We are fully mindful of the need to balance economic activity and energy demand with environmental sustainability,” the Minister added. “The Government of Canada is committed to the development of our energy resources, including the oil sands, in an environmentally and socially responsible manner.”

(Photo Canada Ministry of Natural Resources)

Salon article calls Northern Gateway Keystone’s “evil twin”, asserts pipeline will never be built

Energy Environment Commentary

Michael Byers, the Canada Research Chair in Global Politics and International Law at UBC, writes about the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline in Salon.com, largely for an American audience, calling the pipeline The evil twin of the Keystone XL oil pipeline

U.S. opponents of the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline should take take note: One of the greatest weaknesses of the proposed 1,980 mile-long pipeline from Canada’s tar sand fields to refineries in Texas actually lies in British Columbia on Canada’s west coast.

That’s where a second pipeline (“Northern Gateway”) could link the tar sands of central Canada to coastal British Columbia.

The U.S. State Department has accepted assertions that the production of heavy oil will increase regardless of whether Keystone XL is built, because the Northern Gateway pipeline would bring oil for shipment to China. Denying permission for Keystone XL would not promote the U.S. national interest in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the State Department says, because China will use the energy anyway.

Byers then goes on to describe in great detail the opposition to the pipeline in British Columbia from First Nations and residents of the northern part of the province. He also describes growing opposition to the expansion of the Kinder Morgan pipeline to Vancouver. (See today’s story Kinder Morgan buys natural gas pipeline) especially the hazards of sending tankers through Second Narrows.

From all that Byers concludes:

In short, there’s a bit of snake oil in the pipeline-to-China assumptions. The U.S. State Department must assess the full environmental impact of Keystone XL. It cannot ignore the carbon footprint of Canada’s tar sands because of an alternative pipeline to China that does not exist and will likely never be built.

It seems that Byers is certainly jumping to conclusions that the Northern Gateway will never be built, especially since Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and cabinet ministers John Moore and Joe Oliver has said it is in the national interest that the Northern Gateway should proceed.

Washington Post editorial argues that Northern Gateway will go ahead

Energy Link (Editorial)

An editorial in the Oct. 10, 2011 issue of the Washington Post argues that it is realistic that the Northern Gateway pipeline (without actually mentioning the name) will go ahead.

In Keystone XL pipeline is the wrong target for protesters

The Post takes aim at the protestors who oppose the Keystone pipeline, seeing it as a passionate fight against fossil fuels. The editorial then goes on to say

True, the petroleum that comes from Alberta’s “tar sands” isn’t very clean; it produces more carbon emissions than light sweet crude. And, true, pipelines can leak, as recent ruptures in Michigan and under the Yellowstone River demonstrate.

But rejecting the pipeline won’t reduce global carbon emissions or the risk of environmentally destructive spills.

Canada’s government — and rising world petroleum prices — guarantee that the country will extract the oil from its tar sands, and that Asia will take it if America doesn’t. That means using pipelines to transport Canada’s heavy crude hundreds of miles to the West Coast and then shipping it abroad, burning fossil fuels and risking ocean spills along the way. China already has a large stake in Canadian oil production. Plans are already in the works to build the necessary pipelines.

The Post notes the allegations that the bitumen sands crude, once refined will not benefit the US but will be exported through the Gulf Coast. Then adds, “But if export markets are that attractive, Canadian crude will reach them without transiting the United States, and American refineries will get their low-grade crude from somewhere else.” For the Post the bottom line is American security, preferring low-grade crude form Canada rather than from hostile Venezuela or the volatile Middle East.

The Post concludes:

Producing energy is a dirty business, and it will remain so for a long time, even with the right policies. Part of facing this reality is admitting that how the world produces energy must change over time. But another part is accepting that oil production will continue for decades and clear-headedly managing the risks — not pretending we can wish them away

The online comments, as you might expect, are about one third in favour (jobs and the economy), one third opposed (climate change, oil spills) and the rest the usual nasty diatribes.

Editors note: Whether or not one supports or opposes the Northern Gateway pipeline, the editorial is a prime example of arm chair rhetoric probably composed by a writer comfortably living in a Georgetown brownstone who will never come within 1000 kilometres of Douglas Channel. It is well known that The Washington Post is not the paper it was 20 years ago. The muddled talk about “clear-headedly managing the risks” shows how the once-great paper has declined. The editorial is actually insulting to both sides, since it is obvious that the Post editorial board have no knowledge of the thousands of pages filed by Enbridge that outline the risks of the Northern Gateway and the company’s contingency plans nor the reservations about the pipeline outlined by the environmental movement, First Nations and local residents.

But then not many news organizations these days bother to assign reports to actually come to the scene of any story. In recent months, just three, Alberta Oil, The Calgary Herald and The Globe and Mail have come here. The rest are content to sit at their desks and work on, as one former managing editor of a major Canadian daily put it, “telephone-assisted reporting.”

Not enough bitumen production to support both Northern Gateway and Keystone XL consultant says

Energy

Bloomberg news reports that a Calgary based energy research company believes Enbridge’s Oil Sands Project Is Years Early

Enbridge Inc., Canada’s largest pipeline operator, wouldn’t need to build the Northern Gateway project to export Alberta’s oil-sands crude for almost a decade if TransCanada Corp.’s Keystone XL is approved this year, according to IHS CERA, an energy research company.

The 732-mile (1,177-kilometer) Northern Gateway pipeline would pump 525,000 barrels a day from near Edmonton, Alberta, to the port of Kitimat, British Columbia, where crude would be loaded on tankers bound for Asia. The line, scheduled to start in 2017, would reduce Canadian dependence on U.S. markets and compete with the Keystone XL, designed to pipe 700,000 barrels a day to refineries in Texas along the Gulf of Mexico by 2013.

Jackie Forrest, a director of global oil at IHS CERA, said there won’t be enough oil sands production to support Northern Gateway’s launch even if, as she expects, Keystone XL approval helps the output double in 10 years to 3 million barrels a day.

The Bloomberg article goes on to quote one analyst who believes the Northern Gateway fight will get a lower profile than the Keystone XL.

Northern Gateway faces opposition from environmentalists and Indian groups because it passes through the Great Bear Rainforest and raises the risk of supertanker oil spills in the Douglas Channel. However, the Canada-only route may make the project less prominent than Keystone XL, which has drawn protests from celebrities such as Daryl Hannah and Margot Kidder, who played Lois Lane in several Superman movies.

“Northern Gateway would be an all-Canadian fight and thus perhaps could be less sensational and muscular, think Canadian Football League vs. U.S. NFL, but nonetheless might get very contentious,” Judith Dwarkin, chief energy economist for ITG Investment Research, wrote in an e-mail from Calgary.

Approval of the Keystone XL may not be the slam dunk that some in the Calgary oil patch believe. As Konrad Yababuski reports in The Globe and Mail in Keystone XL: More about the politics than the petroleum

Proponents of the TransCanada Corp. project, which would double the amount of Alberta crude flowing south, now fear that President Barack Obama will give in to pressure from the base of the Democratic Party to nix the pipeline.

With Mr. Obama’s approval rating sliding to a record low – leading more than half of Americans to think for the first time that he will be a one-term President – the White House needs to bring every stray Democrat it can find back into the fold before the 2012 election.

The progressive wing of the Democratic Party has been feeling particularly unloved by this White House. Killing the Keystone XL project would be a powerful way for the administration to show its renewed affection.

Which means of course if President Barack Obama does kill Keystone XL to keep his base happy, there will be more than enough bitumen sands for the Northern Gateway pipeline.

Editor’s note: Disclosure. I have always liked the CFL game, with three downs and the bigger field over the NFL, so the analogy is probably apt in describing the contentious Northern Gateway debate, a more wide open and interesting struggle.

Accuracy is the best neutrality. It’s all about the bitumen.

Editorial

Memo to my media friends and colleagues:

Last Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2011, the District of Kitimat sponsored an “educational forum” here at Mount Elizabeth Theatre on the controversial Northern Gateway pipeline project which, if approved, would carry bitumen from Alberta to the port of Kitimat and on to Asia.
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There was an hour of presentations covering all sides the debate, followed by a question and answer period.

The Enbridge educational forum in Kitimat, Sept. 20, 2011. Left to right, Ellis Ross, Chief Counsellor, Haisla First Nation, Mike Bernier, mayor of Dawson Creek, Greg Brown, environmental consultant and John Carruthers, President Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipelines. (Robin Rowland/ Northwest Coast Energy News)

Throughout those two hours, the word used to describe the substance that could come to Kitimat through that pipeline was the word “bitumen.” Panelists Ellis Ross, Chief Councillor of the Haisla First Nation, John Carruthers, president of Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipelines talked about “bitumen,” so did environmental consultant Greg Brown, they all spoke about “bitumen.” The questions from the audience were about “bitumen.”

Of course, after a couple of years of hearings,briefings and educational forums on the Northern Gateway pipeline project, with more to come (especially when the Joint Review Panel’s formal hearings begin here in January) the people of Kitimat are used to the word “bitumen.” Everyone from grade school kids to seniors know the right words to use, especially since Kitimat is also the site of proposed liquified natural gas projects (which introduced a whole new set of terminology.)

When we talk about (and sometimes debate) the Northern Gateway project on the cross trainers and treadmills at the Riverlodge gym, the word used is “bitumen.”

While the Kitimat meeting was underway the rest of the continent, and especially the media was focused on another pipeline project, the proposed Keystone XL project that would carry bitumen from Alberta down to Texas to be refined there.

So it was no real surprise when Open File Ottawa ran a short item by freelancer Trevor Pritchard on the debate over media use of the words “oils sands” vs the words “tar sands.”

Type in “Alberta tar sands” into Google, and you get 852,000 results. Perform a search for “Alberta oil sands” instead, and you end up with 334,000 results–not even half that. And if you change “Alberta” to “Alberta’s,” the gap widens even further.
So why do most media outlets tend to default to the phrase “oil sands”? Is “tar sands” pejorative? Or do both terms carry their own bias?

Pritchard pointed back to an article in the Tyee posted after the Calgary Herald attacked the late NDP leader Jack Layton for using the term tar sands.

Tyee quoted the Calgary Herald editorial (no longer visible on the web)this way:

Interestingly, the Calgary Herald didn’t so much take issue with the statements themselves, as it did with his vocabulary.
“It’s not what Layton said,” read an editorial from early April. “It’s the loaded and inaccurate language he used repeatedly, referring to the oil sands as ‘dirty’ and ‘tar sands’ — a word that’s part of the propaganda lexicon for radical environmentalists.”

Nearly two weeks later, the Herald was still ruminating about Layton’s and Obama’s language choices.
“Tar sands is inaccurate and pejorative,” wrote columnist Paula Arab.

In today’s polarized world, you might expect the Calgary Herald, in the centre of the Alberta oil patch, to be in favour of the term “oil sands”

However, most of the mainstream media seem to have bought into the idea that if the sandy hydrocarbons found in northern Alberta are called “tar sands” (it certainly looks and smells and feels like tar) it is pejorative, while “oil sands” are neutral. As comments on both the Tyee and Open File stories show, those who tend toward the environmental point of view consider the term “oil sands” energy industry spin.

Open File asked the Canadian Press for their take on the subject, since the CP Stylebook (like its equivalent from the AP in the United States) is considered the usage Bible not only for the Canadian media for most non-academic writing in the Canada.

Senior Editor James McCarten responded:

Canadian Press style calls for the use of the term “oilsands” (all one word), as it is both the official term used by the petroleum industry and the least susceptible to misinterpretation or misunderstanding. It is also in keeping with accepted style for terms like “oilpatch” and “oilfield” — consistency is a critical element of any effective writing style.
It’s also important to choose the most neutral term available.

“Tarsands,” while at one time the industry’s chosen term, has been appropriated in recent years by opponents of the oil industry and has taken on political connotations, so we choose to avoid it.

To which commenter Raay Makers responded:

So let me get this straight: CP deems the term preferred by the petroleum industry “neutral,” while the term “appropriated” by opponents of the oil industry isn’t. They obviously have misconceptions of the meaning of the term neutral.

An hour after I read the Open File story, I turned to CBC TV News and watched Margot McDiarmid’s item on the Keystone debate. In her first reference to the Keystone pipeline, McDiarmid used the term “oil sands bitumen” to describe what would go through the Keystone to Texas. Relatively accurate. But then at the end of her item she said “oil” would be flowing through the Northern Gateway Pipeline to Kitimat.

Even though I worked in radio or TV for three decades and know the necessity to keep things as simple as possible in a short item, I was appalled. To describe the bitumen that is going through those pipelines simply as “oil” is misleading and inaccurate.

If you’ve sat through briefings, attended hearings and read the documents, it is clear that bitumen behaves differently in a pipeline from conventional oil, whether it is crude oil or refined oil.

That difference is at the heart of the debate over both pipelines. It appears that no one outside of the local media here in Kitimat and media along the Northern Gateway route seems to understand that difference, not even at the centre of the current debate about the Keystone XL in Nebraska.

So I checked. What term is the media using to describe what will flow through the Keystone and Northern Gateway pipelines? The media is all over the place, calling it oil, crude oil, crude, tar sands oil, oil sands crude, oil sands bitumen.

I first checked the CBC.ca site:

Max Paris in the written story tied to McDiarmid’s item uses “oil sands bitumen,” the CBC interactive uses “oil sands crude.”

Today’s New York Times uses the term “oil pipeline” to describe the Keystone project.

In a Nebraska local paper, the Omaha World Herald, reporter Paul Hammel describes it as “a crude-oil pipeline”

In another local paper, the Lincoln Nebraska, Journal Star reporter Art Hovey uses “oil.”

An Associated Press story today, (at least as it appears on the Forbes site) is totally inconsistent, with the web friendly summary speaks about Keystone XL carrying “tar sands oil,” but the main body of the story calls it “oil.”

Reuters uses the term “oil” in this story

An editorial from Bloomberg uses “oil” in the lead

On first look, it might seem wrong to allow TransCanada Corp. to build the 1,700-mile Keystone XL pipeline to carry oil from Alberta, Canada, to the U.S. Gulf Coast.

It goes on to eloquently describe the situation in Alberta’s sandy hydrocarbons

What’s more, a new conduit would seem to only encourage the further development of the Athabascan oil sands in Alberta. This is a dirty business, to be sure: Vast tracts of spruce and fir are cleared to make way for open-pit mines, from which deposits of sticky black sand are shoveled out and then rinsed to yield viscous tar. For deeper deposits, steam is shot hundreds of feet into the earth to melt the tar enough that it can be pumped to the surface. Then there are the emissions associated with mining Canadian oil sands: It produces two and a half times as much carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases as oil drilling in, say, Saudi Arabia or west Texas.

Bloomberg as you might expect from a business site, goes on to give the argument for building Keystone XL in terms of jobs and the economy (and in a much more measured way than the strident columnists in the Postmedia chain here)

Bloomberg concludes

Keep in mind, the U.S. is crisscrossed by thousands of miles of pipelines carrying crude oil, liquid petroleum and natural gas. One of these is the Keystone 1 pipeline, which already carries crude from the oil sands. Yes, these pipes sometimes leak — spectacularly last year when almost 850,000 gallons of oil spilled from a ruptured pipe in Michigan. Far more often, when leaks occur, they are small and self-contained.
After the public hearings, the U.S. should give TransCanada the green light — and then make sure the company manages pipeline design and construction with care.

Get the picture. As far as I can tell, no one, no one in the major news media is accurately describing what will flow through the Keystone XL and Northern Gateway pipelines. Again the accurate descriptions come from the local media in northwestern BC who have attended years of local briefings and hearings.

Oil comes from oil sands, right? Here is where the use of the term “oilsands’ leads to misleading coverage. It is where senior editors at CP and other senior editors at other news organizations are wrong. Saying oil or crude will flow through these specific pipelines does lead to misinterpretation and misunderstanding and it comes directly from the ill advised use of the words “oil sands.”

Say “oil” and, although it is a generic term, most people think of the substance you put in an engine, ranging from the thick, black gooey stuff that goes into a two stroke boat engine, through the lighter oil that goes into your car or the even lighter oil used by model makers. “Petroleum” would probably be a better generic term.

Say crude and most people would think of James Dean covered in the crude from the gusher in Giant or similar movie scenes. Or for those old enough to remember, they think of the opening of the Beverly Hillbillies when the “bubbling crude” comes out of the ground at Jed Camplett’s farm.

So what is going through the pipelines? While Enbridge uses the term “oil” in its promotional brochure on Nothern Gateway (pdf file), in the briefings here Enbridge officials always talk of “bitumen.” They know that the people living in Kitimat, again whether supporter or opponent, have done their home work. Everyone here knows it won’t be “oil” in the pipeline. But it seems that the public relations branches of Enbridge and TransCanada still believe they can spin the media into reporting the pipelines will just be carrying oil.

So what is going to be in the Northern Gateway and Keystone XL pipelines? Read the documents filed with the Joint Review Panel and you find out it is “diluted bitumen” (The bitumen from those sandy hydrocarbons in Alberta has to be diluted or it won’t flow through the pipeline.)

Documents filed with the Joint Review Panel by Stantec, an environmental consulting company based in Fredericton, New Brunswick, hired by Enbridge, and frequently retained by the energy industry uses this definition:

diluted bitumen A hydrocarbon consisting of bitumen diluted with condensate in order to reduce viscosity, rendering it suitable to be transported via a pipeline. In addition to condensate, other subjects can be used as a dilutant (naptha and synthetic oil)

So what is condensate?

Again as defined by industry consultant Stantec condensate is:

condensate: A low density mixture of hydrocarbon liquids that are present in raw natural gas produced from many natural gas fields or which condense out of raw gas if the temperature is reduced below the hydrocarbon dew point temperature of the raw gas.

(Another angle the media has ignored about the Northern Gateway project. While it carries diluted bitumen west from Alberta, there is a twin pipeline that carries the condensate east to Alberta.)

What to call the pipelines and the product?

So let’s talk about Northern Gateway and Keystone XL first. These pipelines are different from the other pipelines that Bloomberg and other media say crisscross North America.

These pipelines will be carrying diluted bitumen, not oil, not crude.

When the public think of oil they think of a lubricant that enhances flow, not a gritty substance that has to be diluted before it can move. Diluted bitumen is a mixture of sand and soil and crude hydrocarbons, with various petrochemicals added to so that that mixture can actually get through the pipelines.

The use of diluted bitumen is raising all kinds of questions. There were questions at last week’s forum on the effect of the friction from the sand on the stability of the pipelines. There were questions at the forum about the corrosive nature of the condensate added to the bitumen on the stability of the pipelines.

These questions do not arise when it comes to conventional pipelines which have been built for the past century.

While there have been major oil spills for decades on land and sea, there has never been a major spill of bitumen in either a pristine watershed or the ocean. There has never been a major spill involving this mixture of bitumen and condensate.

Unfortunately, the ultimate answer to the question of how dangerous such as spill could be, will only be found out if there is disaster.

A photo map of the Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline (in yellow) showing its route close to the Kitimat River, site of the town’s water supply. (Enbridge. Filed with the Joint Review Panel)

The Northern Gateway Pipeline follows the route of the Kitimat River. One of the most frequent questions is what happens to the town’s water supply if the pipeline breaks.

There are thousands of pages on the Joint Review Panel website that show that Enbridge and their consultants have done all kinds of tests, modelling and contingency planning to support their stand the pipelines and the tankers are as safe as possible. There are documents from environmental groups and others that take the opposite position.

So to maintain its already shaky credibility the media must be accurate. Accuracy is the best form of neutrality.

So here are my style/copy suggestions:

The media should call what is going into the Northern Gateway and Keystone XL pipelines “diluted bitumen” on first reference and “bitumen” on subsequent references.

It is NOT accurate to call it “oil.” It is not really accurate to call it “crude.”

It is crude oil mixed with sand and the condensate chemicals. To call what will go through the Northern Gateway and Keystone XL pipeline simply as oil or crude is leading to gross misinterpretation and complete misunderstanding.

The media should continue to use oil when they are referring to conventional oil flowing through a conventional pipeline.

The public isn’t stupid. If you ask a Grade Three student in Kitimat about bitumen and condensate you’ll get a pretty good answer. If the media has to produce sidebars, graphics, interactives, explainer items, to explain what bitumen is, the sooner the better, so that those taking part in the debate and those reporting it know what they’re talking about.

Tar sands/Oil sands

It is clear that the Canadian media managers who decided in the mid 2000s that the term “oil sands” was more neutral than “tar sands” blundered.

Yes the environmentalists do use “tar sands” and for some it can be pejorative. But if you have ever seen the stuff it certainly is tar.

Just as Enbridge uses “oil” in its brochure on Northern Gateway but says the real thing “bitumen” in meetings, “oil sands” is the preferred energy industry spin term. The use of the term “oil sands” reduces media credibility.

Using “oil sands” likely amplifies the general belief that the “corporate media” is in the pocket of big business and thus reduces the credibility of the shrinking numbers of hardworking reporters left working in the field.

Here crowd sourcing and social media help. There are postings both on Open File and Tyee saying the terms “bitumen sands” or “bitumen-bearing sands” are proper neutral terms. I have used the term “sandy hydrocarbons” in this article, I came across it in a briefing document some while ago and it stuck in my mind (though I can’t remember where I saw it).

It is up to public editors, ombudspersons and style book editors to make the call here for their organizations. I believe that if the media starts using “bitumen sands” as a technically accurate and neutral term for what is found in northern Alberta, the readers and viewers will quickly accept it.

Staff of the Joint Review Panel brief residents of
Kitimat on the process, June 16, 2011.
(Robin Rowland/Northwest Coast Energy News)

The big picture. Why isn’t the environment in the style books?

There is a bigger problem that I discovered when I was looking into this issue. I checked the Canadian Press Stylebook to see what the editors said about the environment and found nothing. Absolutely nothing. There are chapters on business news, entertainment, sports, even travel, but nothing on environmental coverage.

A very quick check with copy editor friends seems to have come up with same result across the media. Media stylebooks don’t consider the environment important enough to have a full chapter. (I may have missed some of course, the check was very quick) yet environmental stories are in the news every day.

The Associated Press was founded in 1848, in part so the New York newspapers could cooperate in getting the latest business news from Europe, first from ships and then from the transAtlantic cable. So business news has been essential to the media for at least a century and a half. This, I believe, has created this historical, and probably unintentional, institutional bias that favours word usage preferred by business. If media style books had environment chapters then the question of oil sands/tar sands would have been considered more thoroughly and the “neutrality” of “oil sands” questioned.

Who knows what other environmental issues have been considered only superficially because stylebooks don’t have a chapter on the environment?

Reporters in the field are often left angry and frustrated by rulings from public editors and ombudspersons who may, despite their efforts, err on the side of “neutrality” rather than “accuracy” especially in this era of extreme polarization.

Media managers often take the path of least resistance, especially if they are being inundated with complaining e-mails and letters.

A stylebook chapter on the environment should stress accuracy over neutrality. Thus it serves the public.

A rigorous chapter in a media style book on the environment (and also on science which is also lacking) would give guidance to reporters in the field, editors at the desk and allow managers to tell the complainers with agendas just how the issue has been examined.

This site has always used bitumen to describe what will be in the Northern Gateway Pipeline. From now on it will use bitumen sands in copy, and will use tar sands and oil sands in direct quotes as appropriate. I hope the rest of the media will follow.

Disclosure: I worked for CBC.ca from 1996 until I took early retirement in 2010. I have also freelanced for both Canadian Press and OpenFile.

Glossary of terms used in Stantec environmental report (PDF excerpt from original file)

Natural Resources minister Joe Oliver continues to push Northern Gateway

Energy Links

Conservative Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver is continuing to promote the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline. In a speech to the Canadian Club in Toronto, Oliver promoted both the Keystone XL pipeline from the Alberta oil sands to Texas and the Northern Gateway pipeline through Kitimat.

The Globe and Mail reports in New pipelines crucial to expand energy exports: Minister

Canada needs projects like Enbridge Inc. Northern Gateway pipeline to provide crucial access to growing markets for the country’s energy exports, says Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver.

In remarks prepared for a speech Friday in Toronto, the Minister said the federal government would respect the regulatory review now being conducted on the Gateway project. But he made it clear Ottawa supports the construction of oil pipelines to the west coast, despite opposition from environmental groups and First Nations…..

Projects such as the proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline would connect Alberta’s oil sand to the port at Kitimat on the coast of British Columbia, where tankers could transport oil to Asian customers.”

While he said the government respects the regulatory process, he added: “It is a key strategic objective to diversify our customer base” beyond the U.S., which now accounts for 97 per cent of Canada’s oil exports.

The Associated Press also covered Oliver’s speech, as published in the Washington Post:

Canada’s natural resource minister says the country needs Enbridge’s proposed Northern Gateway pipeline to the Pacific coast to be built so that it can diversify its energy exports to China.

Natural Resource Minister Joe Oliver noted in a speech Friday that the U.S. is basically Canada’s only energy customer. Oliver says it is a key strategic objective to diversify the customer base.

But Aboriginal and environmental opposition to the Pacific pipeline is fierce. The opponents fear it will leak. The local member of Parliament, Nathan Cullen, has said accidents are inevitable in the rough waters around Kitimat, British Columbia, where the pipeline will end. And no one has forgotten the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989, some 800 miles (1,300 kilometers) north of Kitimat….

Sinopec, a Chinese state-controlled oil company, has a stake in a $5.5 billion plan drawn up by the Alberta-based Enbridge to build the Northern Gateway Pipeline from Alberta to the Pacific coast province of British Columbia.

Natural Resources Canada news release: Minister Oliver Touts Canada’s Energy Resources and Economic Strengths

Harper appears to endorse Northern Gateway in TV interview

Energy Politics

In an interview with Bloomberg News, Prime Minister Stephen Harper strongly endorsed the bitumen pipeline from Alberta to Texas, the controversial Keystone XL project and then went on to apparently push for the Enbridge Northern Gateway project by saying “there is all the more reason why Canada should look at trade diversification and particularly diversification of energy exports.”

In the interview with the business news service Harper said U.S. approval of TransCanada Corp.’s proposed $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline is a

“no-brainer” because it will create jobs and add to America’s secure energy reserves.

“The need for energy in the U.S. is enormous, the alternatives for the U.S. are not good, on every level,”

Harper said he’s “confident” the pipeline will be built.

Keystone would link Canada’s oil sands to U.S. refineries on the Gulf of Mexico coast. The 2,673-kilometer pipeline would begin in Hardisty, Alberta, and cross Saskatchewan, Montana, South Dakota and Nebraska.

The alternatives for the United States are not good. And, you know, on every level, not just economic (but) political, social, even environmental, the case is very strong for this…”The fact that there are these kinds of pressures to, you know, to potentially take decisions which would, in my judgment . . . to avoid a decision would be a complete no-brainer.”

Shawn McCarty of The Globe and Mail interprets Harper’s statement this way:

the federal government has broadly endorsed the oil industry’s efforts to build new pipelines to the West Coast to open up new markets in Asia.

The National Energy Board is reviewing plans for a natural gas pipeline to Kitimat, B.C., and a plant to liquefy the gas so it can be exported via tanker.

The NEB and Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency are holding a joint review of Enbridge Inc.’s more controversial Northern Gateway oil pipeline to the coast. The Gateway project is opposed by environmental groups and first nations, whose traditional lands would be affected.

Harper has now added his voice to cabinet ministers Joe Oliver and James Moore in pushing for the Northern Gateway Pipeline, which once again raises the question, why have the Joint Review Panel since it appears the decision to go ahead has already been made?

Related Link Vancouver Sun U.S. approval of Keystone a ‘no-brainer’: Harper

Obama press secretary questioned on anti oil sands demonstrations

Energy Environment links

U.S. president Barack Obama’s press secretary, Jay Carney, was asked about the continuing demonstrations in Washington against the Alberta oil sands and the Keystone XL pipeline proposal during a “gaggle” (an informal news conference) aboard Air Force One en route to Minnesota today.

The White House released this transcript of the brief exchange:

Q Also, anything on these protests outside the White House on this
pipeline? Has the President decided against TransCanada’s permit for the
pipeline? It’s the tar sands pipeline. There have been a lot of arrests
outside the White House about it.

MR. CARNEY: I don’t have anything new on that. I believe the State
Department has — that’s under the purview of the State Department
presently, but I don’t have anything new on that.

Q Is the President aware of the protests?

MR. CARNEY: I haven’t talked to him about it.

Protestors have been demonstrating in a restricted area near the White House and are inviting arrest as part of an ongoing effort to stop the Keystone XL bitumen pipeline from Alberta to Texas. The latest celebrity to take part in the protests was actress Darryl Hannah, who was arrested today, as reported by The Guardian.

The State Department did give its approval to the Keystone XL pipeline on Aug 26, saying, as reported in The Guardian.

The State Department said the proposed 1,700-mile pipeline would not cause significant damage to the environment.

The State Department in its report said the project – which would pipe more than 700,000 barrels a day of tar sands crude to Texas refineries – would not increase greenhouse gas emissions. It also downplayed the risks of an accident from piping highly corrosive tar sands crude across prime American farmland.

Campaigners accused the State Department of consistently overlooking the potential risks of the pipeline.

The largest anti-pipeline demonstration is expected on Sept. 2, when First Nations leaders are expected to join the protests in front of the White House.

As Keystone decision nears, new interest in pipeline safety, especially Enbridge

Links: Energy Environment

The US State Department will announce its decision on the Keystone XL bitumen pipeline from Alberta to Texas as the Calgary Herald reported on July 22

The U.S. State Department said Friday that it will wrap up its
examination of environmental impacts of a proposed Canadian pipeline
expansion from the oilsands in less than a month in order to ensure a
final decision on the controversial project by the end of the year…

Daniel Clune, the principal deputy assistant secretary from the U.S.
Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs,
said that the department would consider a variety of factors, including
recent developments such as a major pipeline spill on the Yellowstone
River, instability in Libya affecting global oil supplies, as well as
this week’s announcement by Canadian Environment Minister Peter Kent
that Canada would increase its monitoring of the impact of oilsands
activity based on recommendations from scientists.

A couple of weeks before the State Department ruling, the US Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) Technical Pipeline Safety Standards Committee (TPSSC) and the Technical Hazardous Liquid Pipeline Safety Standards Committee (THLPSSC) will meet in Arlington, Virginia on August 2, 2011 to consider draft pipeline safety recommendations for the United States called `The State of the National Pipeline Infrastructure–A Preliminary
Report.” The public had until July 13, 2011, to make submissions to be considered
by the subcommittee members prior to submission of their draft
recommendations to the overall committees.

There is a web page from the PHMSA on the July, 2010, Marshall, Michigan, Enbridge pipeline break and spill.

The National Post updates the Marshall Enbridge spill with a report Aftermath of a Spill by Sheldon Alberts.

Now, one year later, local residents and U.S. authorities are taking
stock of the toll. A National Transportation Safety Board investigation
into what caused the two metre gash in the pipeline is ongoing, with its
conclusion perhaps months away.

The Kalamazoo, which in normal
summers would be flush with paddlers and recreational fishermen, is
still closed to the public as a massive effort to clean up the remaining
oil – most of it now submerged on the riverbed – continues.

Also
raging is the heated debate that the Enbridge spill ignited in the
United States and Canada over the safety of pipelines – some new, others
decades old – that carry oil sands bitumen to markets in America’s
heartland.

Canadian oil boom may bring many more tankers to Northwest waters: Seattle Times

Seattle Times

Canadian oil boom may bring many more tankers to Northwest waters

[F]ights over Canada’s oil sands could have an impact much closer to home. One company is hoping to boost oil-sands shipments to Asia through Northwest waters — plans that would quadruple tanker traffic through Vancouver, B.C., and dramatically increase the amount of oil traveling through the Strait of Juan de Fuca.

Some of the tankers the company hopes to accommodate could carry four times more crude than the Exxon Valdez, the supertanker that spilled 11 million gallons of crude into Prince William Sound….

“That’s definitely a lot more crude carriers,” said Chip Booth, a manager with the Washington state Department of Ecology’s spills program. “It certainly represents a bit of a higher risk.”

But it’s far too soon to say how much more.