The latest from city hall. As just an average person, I’d like to hear some explanations from those in opposition about how and where oil and gas should be transported.
I’m an agnostic on this issue, but, as someone who observes that it takes oil/gas to run the modern world and even build bicycles, I’d like to hear more than just “Not here, thanks.”
Anyway, the news release:
(Vancouver) – Vision Vancouver is introducing two motions, one at City Council and one at Park Board, opposing the massive expansion of the Kinder Morgan pipeline and outlining next steps to protect Vancouver.
Mayor Gregor Robertson is bringing forward a motion for next Tuesday’s Council meeting that formally opposes the expansion, and asks staff to prepare a by-law requiring pipeline operators and oil tankers using Burrard Inlet, Vancouver Harbour and/or the Fraser River to indemnify the City of Vancouver at levels equivalent to a worst-case spill.
“I am very strongly opposed to Kinder Morgan’s plans for a five-fold increase in oil tanker traffic through Vancouver,” said Mayor Gregor Robertson. “We will use absolutely every tool at our disposal to protect Vancouver’s vibrant local economy and natural environment from the enormous risks posed by the threat of a catastrophic oil spill.”
Vision Vancouver park commissioner Niki Sharma has introduced a motion, scheduled for next Monday’s Park Board meeting, for the Board to formally state its strong opposition to any expansion of the pipeline and fulfill its mandate to preserve and protect our green spaces.
“Future generations deserve the same opportunities we have today to enjoy Vancouver’s treasured beaches, parks, and natural environment – especially Vancouver jewels such as Stanley Park,” said Commissioner Sharma. “A five-fold increase in super-tankers through Vancouver simply poses too extreme a risk to our sensitive local coastline and the strong Vancouver
economy it supports.”
Mayor Robertson outlines his opposition to the pipeline expansion proposal in detail in an op-ed in today’s Vancouver Sun.
145 responses so far ↓
1 Lewis N. Villegas // Apr 24, 2012 at 12:51 pm
Which pipeline? I found out by answering a telephone opinion poll that jet fuel is delivered to YVR from a refinery on Burrard Inlet, via an underground pipeline, to a shipping point on the Fraser.
The airport expansion at YVR would necessitate bringing in a greater amount of fuel. The poll was testing support for the options (bigger pipeline, trucks—it was a while ago, so I don’t remember the other options).
Kinder Morgan operates a pipeline from Alberta that connects to points in Burnaby, and Vancouver, along Burrard Inlet for shipping to international destinations.
Historically, Vancouver has been positioned as the shipping port for Prairie products. While I always thought of that as agriculture, the facts are different.
2 klattu // Apr 24, 2012 at 1:11 pm
The answer is to make this world less dependent on fossil fuels. The premise of your argument is egregiously myopic.
Yes, it is a huge prospect, that will be lengthy and difficult to pull off. But is has to start somewhere — and it takes courageous people to stand up and say “no”.
And isn’t it crude bullying to demand that anyone in opposition to a proposal have a counterproposal ready, costs and all? Especially so if the original proposal contains the seeds of obvious vast destruction of environment and livability for millions of people.
3 Max // Apr 24, 2012 at 1:45 pm
As the ‘green’ Mayor has a track record with Tides Canada and is buddy, buddy with Tides’ ‘green’ leader Joel Solomon, who has also contributed huge dollars to Vision to implement his vision, Robertson and Vision have far from ‘clean’ hands when putting this motion on the table.
Their bias is showing,
4 Andrew Browne // Apr 24, 2012 at 1:48 pm
I think Kitimat is a stupid, dangerous port to use for things that are hard to clean up — like oil — because of its narrow channels and difficult approach. Natural gas is more forgiveable, and Prince Rupert would be a better fit for oil than Kitimat (though not necessarily ideal).
As for Burrard Inlet, I accept that it is a port and apart from a general concern about the growth of tar sands development, I can’t bring myself to object over port expansion here in Greater Vancouver (so long as it doesn’t impact ALR, and it continues to respect what is essentially our shared living room–the airshed). A bare minimum condition, perhaps, would be a fully functioning spill response centre complete with staffing, equipment, training, and research and development. At present I believe the most recent federal budget has actually closed the small resource we did have, which strikes me as politically daft. Perhaps the strategy was to close it and “trade it back” for the appearance of a local win?
Expanding on issues of tar sands development, my understanding is that, as with natural gas, the increased export of bitumen and oil will actually serve to increase domestic prices by a non-trivial amount, because these supplies will now float at global prices unimpeded by the tyranny of distance. The beauty of this argument is that it should be meaningful for those who support tar sands development on the basis of concerns over price and supplies (and those opposed to tar sands development will remain so regardless).
5 Mira // Apr 24, 2012 at 2:30 pm
Have you read the title?
“Mayor Robertson, Vision Park Board…”
Juice boy and Juicers, no one else. Sound and clear, like everything in their mandate…
What’s next, the waters of Cortes?
Someone needs to be given a warning, and it’s not Kinder Morgan who needs it, it’s Mayor Gregor and VPB… your job descriptions does not include spending taxpayer’s money on imaginary campaigns, leave that to your NON-POLITICAL – LOL affiliates like D. Suzuki, Tseporash, Joel Salomon,… the city taxpayers is not paying for your extra curriculum activities! Do that on your own time and on your own dime!
6 Mark // Apr 24, 2012 at 2:44 pm
@Mira: I respectfully disagree. One of the planks of Vision’s election platform was to make Vancouver the world’s greenest city by 2020. This sort of action, even if it is only symbolic in the long run, is absolutely in alignment with that platform.
As a taxpayer and voter, this is exactly the kind of leadership I voted for.
There is simply too little to gain, and far too much to lose by increasing tanker traffic fivefold in the Burrard Inlet. It’s just not worth it.
7 Wendy // Apr 24, 2012 at 2:52 pm
Like Frances, I’m agnostic as to what happens with the oil sands. But it is my job to anticipate what will happen (because of its impact on pension fund real estate investments in Alberta) so I read a lot about global oil demand, exports, etc.
My sense is the oil is going to get exported. If not on a pipeline, then on a train (CN can already do this) or a truck (this is how it gets from Cushing OK to the Gulf Coast). My sense is also that pipelines are safer for the environment than a train or a truck, plus produce much lower emissions for the transport.
Also, like Andrew above (#4) I think exporting from Vancouver is probably safer than the alternative because it would be much easier to clean up a spill here–assuming the facility investments are made (and I agree closing the local facility was idiotic politically as well as practically). It would be easier to pull in extra people and supplies if needed to quickly clean up any spill. Lots of people with other jobs in the lower mainland could be cross trained for emergency spill clean ups.
Also, I think twinning the existing Kinder Morgan line might be the safest transport option environmentally. The route is already closely monitored, and proven to work without major incidents (other than the burnaby construction company deciding to dig a hole into the pipeline). This way no new land needs to have a pipeline in it.
If the Mayor wants to take a political stand, he should demand the federal government replace the closed emergency clean up facility or fund a new one perhaps managed by the Port of Metro Vancouver. That would be appropriate.
8 Fred // Apr 24, 2012 at 2:52 pm
So our good Mayor does realize we have been shipping oil out of the Vancouver harbor for almost 60 years with nary a problem.
So since he wants to ball green & stuff, why isn’t he fighting to ban ALL oil tanker traffic?
Current oil good, new oil bad?
Only the pigs know for sure because they are smarter than the rest of us.
Oh, and our ever so Hollyhock loyal Mayor.
Who did he meet and what secret agreement did he make on that trip to New York?
Only Gaia knows for sure.
9 Bill Lee // Apr 24, 2012 at 4:15 pm
… except that it will require serious dredging of the harbour under the two bridges. Kinder Morgan’s time-bomb of a liquified natural gas terminal on Bayview Drive, (north of 7000 block Barnet Highway) also puts ultracold LNG in tankers and some goes to their large Vancouver Wharves (North Vancouver) site. There is the risk of LNG in a rapid phase transition explosion (RPT).
See Cindy Hurst’s February 2008 article for the
Institute for the Analysis of Global Security (IAGS) “The Terrorist Threat to Liquefied Natural Gas: Fact or Fiction?
Dredging is not neutral or clean. And because it is underwater and not seen by ordinary folk such disturbance of the harbour bottom and all the decades of chemicals, heavy metals and such would not be as visible as if digging up Burnaby Mountain for example to allow Zeppelins to pass through.
And in Tuesday’s Globe and Mail which you might read for things other than a Frances Bula article talks about the collapse of natural gas prices and sales, which is two-thirds of the petroleum royalties, products, whatever from Alberta. And this lower prices might kill some of the companies now getting bitumen sands and oil from Alberta.
Besides Kinder Morgan is weaving an oriental phantasm about the project, whereas it is another way to ship products down the coast to America and beyond rather than the mysterious East.
I bring to your attention Kinder Morgan’s coal export wars in Portland, and this month’s Sitelines Insitute paper (16 pages 1.1 megabytes)
http://www.sightline.org/research/energy/coal/the-facts-about-kinder-morgan/Coal-Kinder-Morgan-April-12_final.pdf
Can we consider K-M a reputable company?
10 Bill Lee // Apr 24, 2012 at 4:19 pm
And see the Black Press (Burnaby Now, Richmond Review etc) and their 4–part series of combined reportage on the K-M proposal and related oil and water disasters.
See bottom of
http://www.richmondreview.com/news/147207745.html?mobile=true
OIL & WATER SERIES INDEX
A Black Press series exploring the logistics, risks and politics of Kinder Morgan’s proposed oil pipeline expansion.
Kinder Morgan Canada announced this month that it will seek to twin its Trans Mountain Pipeline between northern Alberta and Burnaby. The twinning would mean a huge increase in the amount of crude that transits the pipeline and the number of oil tankers travelling local waters.
PART 1:
How safe are oil tankers travelling southern B.C. waters?
Notable accidents involving oil
Boaters concerned about more oil tanker traffic coming to Burrard Inlet
Airlines pursue Richmond pipeline to satisfy growth
PART 2:
What happens if there’s an oil spill in B.C.?
‘People of the Inlet’ oppose Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion
PART 3:
Is B.C. destined to be Alberta’s oil superport?
Burnaby company in the business of disaster response
11 Higgins // Apr 24, 2012 at 8:22 pm
I am sick entirely with this Mayor who’s only highlight of the day and agenda may be described as “how can I Robertson become the greenest man on my own Happy Planet!” doesn’t matter at whose expense. The greenest city by 2020 LOL! says his motto …
Nicholae Ceausesco the former Romanian dictator did the same thing to his own people, ignoring all the signs, not listening to anyone but his corrupt handpicked advisers, and blindingly followed his bankrupt agenda. Look in Wikipedia if you want to know how it turned out for him.
Same here, a novice in charge of a city, with a worshiping wish.
God save us all !
12 Max // Apr 25, 2012 at 8:09 am
@Higgings #11:
I was at an event last night – and the topic of how much money the city raked in via parking metres was a bit of a topic, as people kept having to leave to plug their parking spots.
Let’s just say the word ‘greed’ came up .. a lot.
13 spartikus // Apr 25, 2012 at 9:36 am
Pipeline plan triggers scramble for Vancouver bylaw.
This doesn’t strike me as an unreasonable position at all.
This is about risk. Financial risk. And it’s about probability. Statistical probability. This is from Transport Canada:
Each year, based on current levels of tanker traffic, Canada can expect over 100 small spills (less than a tonne), about 10 moderate spills (about 100 tonnes), and at least one major spill (100 to 10,000 tonnes). A catastrophic spill (greater than 10,000 tonnes), for which we are totally unprepared, can be expected once every 15 years.
Under the expansion plan, oil tanker traffic would go from 70/yr to 360/yr.
How many other ports that handle oil are close to major population centres? I don’t know the answer. New Orleans pops to mind, but that’s probably not the best example for “pro-oil”.
How many are natural ports, like Vancouver, where currents and tides might trap oil?
Other than some more jobs created, what are the economic benefits to the City of Vancouver? To the Province of British Columbia?
If you read the article above, it’s not just the City of Vancouver who are hesitant….
14 brilliant // Apr 25, 2012 at 10:32 am
Maybe Mayor Moonbeam should refer to the city’s original motto: By Land and Sea We Prosper.
Or maybe he proposes to change it to: By Pixie Dust and Unicorn Farts We Prosper.
15 Glissando Remmy // Apr 25, 2012 at 10:39 am
Thought of The Day
“Pied-a-Terre followed by Pie-en-la-Boca!”
What a surprise everyone!
After securing an outpost in the Wild Wild West for another three years (Pied-a-Terre), the Night-Mayor and sidekick, flies to New York on Vancouver taxpayers money – no comment, gets his marching papers from the Rockefellers and back he comes, and here we are, another publicity stunt in the interest of… who exactly?
If this is not the Foot-in-the-Mouth (Pie-en-la-Boca) disease, I don’t know what is.
Read this pearl that one poster above writes:
“I respectfully disagree. One of the planks of Vision’s election platform was to make Vancouver the world’s greenest city by 2020.”
OK, so what did we find out?
The bullshit was written on the wall, and someone knows how to read.
Then he adds:
“This sort of action, even if it is only symbolic in the long run, is absolutely in alignment with that platform.”
So, in here, he recognizes that even if it’s all bullshit in the long run, now that we have it written on the wall…
And then he concludes:
“As a taxpayer and voter, this is exactly the kind of leadership I voted for.”
Need I say more? Stupidity or a calculated act of self sabotage?
I know it’s all bullshit, and it’s all a farce, but hey, they said that was the plan form the get-go, that’s why I voted for him, the guy looked me in the eye!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YOh-rpvjYg
Don’t be fooled, Vision Vancouver, Robertson and the rest of the gang, are preaching financial Armageddon, while they cannot plan for a freaking Olympic Village profitable sale – look who’s talking about financial risk!
Reimer is “financially devastated” in the event of an oil spill, but she didn’t even blink when, as a result of their own incompetence, Vancouver city’s coffers were devastated three terrible years in a row.
How about that Andrea? How much can one charge in Parking fees to cover some of the damage costs?
I think Mira’s reference to “Nicolae Ceausescu” #5 is appropriate… there it is, the best example of someone blindsided by his own agenda. This should give the reader some food for thought.
Now let’s get to the next Enviro Cash-Cow-Flow of sorts. I heard that an asteroid the size of Cuba is on collision trajectory with the planet Earth by 2300.
Yeah, terrible.
But I have a plan. It’s the only plan. I know best.
You’ll have to make some life style changes. It will cost you. But it’s worthy, despite that you won’t benefit from it or be alive to see it to fruition. Paying for the defense doesn’t come cheap, my companies only hires the best of the best. So where was I? Oh, yeah, more money from you, ok… here’s what you must do… 7/11!
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
16 Andrea C. // Apr 25, 2012 at 10:52 am
I could give a hoot what Vision thinks about a pipeline.
Let’s see what they say, and more importantly, do regarding garbage incineration right here in the lower mainland.
My money has them bending right over to shepard in this dubious “green” solution. Incinerators across the country and around the world, even with the fanciest safeguards, spew dioxins and furans into the atmosphere. Incinerator-crazed Japan has the highest PCB count in the western world, and their citizens measure the highest personal levels of contamination.
I could care less about some posturing and grandstanding about a pipeline. However, I am eager to know if Vision plans to facilitate local pollution vis a vis garbage incineration. I’m not about to fall for lower mainland politicians’ “look over here… no, over here” tactics.
17 mezzanine // Apr 25, 2012 at 11:07 am
How many other ports that handle oil are close to major population centres? I don’t know the answer. New Orleans pops to mind, but that’s probably not the best example for “pro-oil”.
Hamburg, Germany and Genoa, Italy come to mind.
‘being away from population centres’ would support Kitimat or prince Rupert as potential sites.
18 Tessa // Apr 25, 2012 at 11:15 am
“I’d like to hear some explanations from those in opposition about how and where oil and gas should be transported.”
Nowhere. Not here, not Kitimat, not anywhere else either. Leave it in the ground and start looking seriously at alternatives.
19 mezzanine // Apr 25, 2012 at 11:49 am
^ you mean like putting things in like more taxes for translink, waste-for-energy incinerators and bike lanes that are all far less controversial and easier to approve?
20 spartikus // Apr 25, 2012 at 11:50 am
Hamburg. Right.
It’s odd that statistics on port traffic is difficult to find. However…
In 2010 the Port of Vancouver handled 8,834,162 metric tonnes of petroleum products.
According to this news release…Hamburg handled 10.2 million metric tonnes of petroleum products.
What the insurance arrangements are for Hamburg I don’t know.
21 gman // Apr 25, 2012 at 12:16 pm
But wouldn’t a big oil spill cause the sealevel to rise,oh my its worse than we thought!!!!
22 Bill Lee // Apr 25, 2012 at 12:51 pm
@mezzanine // Apr 25, 2012 at 11:07 am #17
You might try
http://www.itopf.com/information-services/data-and-statistics/
and the left rail on statistics from your ‘friendly’ The International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation (ITOPF)
“[ It ] is a not-for-profit organisation, involved in all aspects of preparing for and responding to ship-source spills of oil, chemicals and other substances in the marine environment.”
“ITOPF was established in 1968, in the wake of the TORREY CANYON incident, to administer the voluntary compensation agreement, Tanker Owners’ Voluntary Agreement concerning Liability for Oil Pollution (TOVALOP), which assured the adequate and timely payment of compensation to those affected by oil spills. TOVALOP came to an end in 1997. As a result, the remit of the Federation changed and the membership and funding arrangements correspondingly altered”
Your basic IMO (International Maritime Organization founded 1948, name from 1982-) has a lot of current references including oil-spills and remediation (= clean up)
http://www.imo.org/OurWork/Environment/PollutionResponse/OilPollutionResources/Pages/Default.aspx
See “Spills History”
There is also the much wider ranging CEDRE (Centre de documentation, de recherche et d’expérimentations sur les pollutions accidentelles des eaux) for all the other things that Vancouver companies are putting in our water along with the Holy Vancouver Sewage outfalls.
Defaults to French http://www.cedre.fr but you will find an English or Spanish button.
Sewage and outfalls. Oh Mister Robertson, you are so brave to drink a litre of storm sewer catchment water each council meeting.
Ha! It must be a federal responsibility otherwise we would have stopped sewage into the sea 3 years ago when he first descended from heaven.
23 Silly Season // Apr 25, 2012 at 1:56 pm
Frances, I too am an “agnostic”, so far. I’d like to see some plans here, for both the Kinder Morgan and Enbridge projects. Vancouver and BC have a lot at risk here.
At the same time, the possible economic benefits in the form of jobs, more tax money and more parity for the Northern part of the province (including native bands), is also of great import.
I am not talking about years and years of debate, but I am talking about:
*responsibility and feasible plans, if BC, the coast of BC and Vancouver are going to be the conduit for these goods
*protecting the environment as much as possible, including getting “money upfront” from the biggest benefactors (Enbridge, Kinder Morgan, Alberta and the purchasers of these materials) as well as a plan for spills, leaks, etc.
*spreading the wealth, in terms of jobs .
So, to “drill down” in the simplest terms.
1) What’s in it for Vancouver?
2) What are the economic benefits for British Columbia. and for that matter, the ROC?
2) Who pays for any environmental degradation—and how do we hold them to it?
I will tell you what I am NOT impressed with, so far.
*The BC Business Council’s presentation last fall, that was heavily skewed to Alberta interests, as per the Enbridge deal . Alberta, do luv ya, want to help you and ROC out with benefits, but we have to do this right.
In fact, that ‘presentation’ was so one-sided, it was more an alarmist sales job in it’s “We gotta hurray, or we’ll lose the opportunity!!!” attitude, than a true look at all important facets of the deal –including protecting BC interests.
BCBC Exec Director Greg d’Avignon, please note.
*Gateway. Sigh. What can I say? This whole project seems to me another back room deal between provinces to get these natural resource and energy plans under way.
Another “we’ll build it now and deal with the problems later’ project.
So, why weren’t we dealing with all sides of this issue, then? Do you really believe that a long term infrastructure project like “Gateway” combined with a “short-term sales job” from BCBC would go unoticed?
Since other roadblocks are being dispensed with PDQ, my suggestions above may do a lot to circumvent any more mistrust on belhalf of the citizens of this province and this city.
24 Max // Apr 25, 2012 at 2:08 pm
And the Vision ‘green’ machine is in full swing…
On twitter:
Vision Vancouver @VisionVancouver
Help stop the expansion of oil tanker traffic in Vancouver! Sign the petition, have your voice heard! http://www.thepetitionsite.com/700/743/331/help-stop-the-expansion-of-tanker-traffic-in-vancouver/ #vanpoli
25 Joe Just Joe // Apr 25, 2012 at 2:51 pm
I’m more curious if the cities acutally have any ability to do anything. My feeling is this is similar to the whole motion against Star Wars years ago.
A few years ago the Ports installed shore power at Canada Place to stop cruise ships idling, it would be nice to see the city work with the Ports to ensure shorepower is not only available at every terminal but required for all visiting ships. It would have an immediate effect on the environment.
26 MB // Apr 25, 2012 at 3:04 pm
The anti-Visionistas are hard at work above, as though the issue of transporting oil is supposed to be above the concern of the mayor of Canada’s premier western port city.
The supertankers proposed are a lot larger than anything we’ve had in Burrard Inlet before. If one rams the Ironworker’s Memorial Bridge hard one foggy night (hey, human error has been known to happen now and then) the entire inlet and Indian Arm will fill up with a thick floating layer of crude and everyone out to Chilliwack will be fumed out.
An oil spill anywhere is a lot more problematic than a spill from a bulk grain carrier or a freighter, and all it takes is one major accident with a supertanker to change minds for generations.
The mayors of Vancouver and Burnaby are asking ligitmate questions about the benefits and risks of increasing the shipment of crude oil by five times, and allowing some of the largest ships in the world access deep into the narrow Burrard Inlet.
So far the local benefits haven’t been as well-defined as the local risks.
27 MB // Apr 25, 2012 at 3:12 pm
For a larger perspective on moving oil sands crude to Asia, here’s Stephen Hume’s column from Monday:
http://www.vancouversun.com/news/sovereignty+threatened+aggressive+push+Enbridge/6501916/story.html#ixzz1szIZtBml
28 MB // Apr 25, 2012 at 3:22 pm
For an economic analysis of Canadian oil export expansion, here’s a link to a report by Robyn Allan. She asks some very important questions, such as why aren’t they exporting oil sands products eastward to the other half of the country that imports oil from undemocratic countries in the volatile Middle East? Why are proponents foaming at the mouth to export raw crude and jobs with a gold rush attitude to Chinese refineries?
Shipping raw crude from Alberta has national economic implications, not just local risks to marine habitat.
http://www.robynallan.com/2012/04/11/an-analysis-of-canadian-oil-expansion-economics/
29 Max // Apr 25, 2012 at 3:37 pm
@MB 3@%:
What I find fascinating: Vision puts up an on-line petition to stop oil traffic of which, I am going to guess, they want and expect to be heard by politicians up the chain.
Yet, recently the MP neighborhood gathered 3,000 signatures and 150+ speakers to stop a blight (RIZE) in their neighborhood, something that is going to effect them directly and not on a speculative ‘what if’, and Vision turned a blind eye.
Why….money – $6.5 M. (But then, money is green – isn’t it)
30 Silly Season // Apr 25, 2012 at 4:21 pm
@MB #27
I guess I don’t need to point out that Robyn Allan (as a President of ICBC, she made a lovely dancer) was appointed to that posting by the NDP ?
I hope we can hold hearings and assess this on the basis of facts and measured assessments, including factors that influence economic benefits and environmental stabilty.
(Thanks for the Hume article, btw. I think I know now how Gordo came to his new posting in London…)
31 Glissando Remmy // Apr 25, 2012 at 4:29 pm
Thought of The Day… Redivivus
“A Pseudo-Mayor and a Pseudo-Council for a Pseudo-Cause in a Pseudo-Jurisdiction.”
MB,
“The anti-Visionistas are hard at work above, as though the issue of transporting oil is supposed to be above the concern of the mayor of Canada’s premier western port city.”
Really?
Not wasting local resources, time and money should be the concern of the Pseudo-Gregor and that of the Pseudo-Vision!
Trying to act cool, for the media, has cost this city too much already.
Robby & comp. have as much klout on this matter as a Chicken Little would have on the egg production line.
So my question to you is, why do they waste city resources, time and money for a out of jurisdiction cause?
Only to beat it on, and on, and on?
Perhaps… to get some more media attention?
The only beaches and waterfront they need to concentrate on preserving, is that in front of David Suzuki’s West Side shack. Let him agitate the fishermen and the mermaids from here on, if he wants, now that he’s become an ‘advocate turned independent politician’ LOL!
We all now who the main Hollyhock money man is, what he stands for, how and where he gets his money from, and for what purposes. I think someone needs to tell this Mayor to start doing his job. His real one.
And if you need more insight on this, here:
LOCAL GOVERNMENTS
“(municipalities and regional districts) hold the authority to plan and regulate land use within
their respective boundaries, which may extend over foreshore and nearshore areas. They do this through official community plans, zoning, development permits, subdivision authority, building permits, and a variety of regulatory
bylaws that affect land development.”
FIRST NATIONS
“have authorities similar to provincial and local governments over upland and aquatic lands within Indian Reserves. Outside Reserves, traditional rights to marine resources are the subject of ongoing Treaty negotiations for many of the First Nations along BC’s coast. The provincial and federal governments have a duty to consult with First Nations on any shoreline tenure applications to ensure that they do not significantly affect aboriginal or treaty rights.”
PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT
“owns most of the foreshore (the area between the low water level and the natural boundary) with a few exceptions, as well as the beds of inland seas such as the Strait of Georgia, Juan de Fuca Strait and Johnstone Strait. The Integrated Land Management Bureau (under the Ministry of Forests and Range)
administers these aquatic lands and issues permits, licences or leases for a wide range of uses – private and public moorage, wharves, marinas, aquaculture, and log storage to name a few. The Province also establishes regional
coastal zone plans where these are needed.”
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
“has jurisdiction over offshore waters – from the low water mark out to 12 nautical miles
along the outer coast. The federal Dept. of Fisheries and Oceans is responsible for managing and protecting fish populations and fish habitat under the Fisheries Act, including shoreline “riparian” habitats, as well as for
maintaining maritime safety through the Coast Guard. Transport Canada is responsible for preserving the public right of navigation under the Navigable Waters Protection Act. Port Authorities are also established under federal
legislation to manage major harbours and facilities that are federal Crown lands, such as Victoria, metro Vancouver, Port Alberni, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo harbours.”
So now that the Canuck’s profile lifting season (oh, how Robertson would have liked another hamper full of local goodies bet, with any American mayor) is over, can all the Vision pseudo-politicians, go back to making sure our garbage is collected on time, property taxes are not deferred for decades by our local house-millionaires, and maybe, try to approve one or two highrises… in Kits?
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
32 Chris Keam // Apr 25, 2012 at 7:21 pm
“We all now who the main Hollyhock money man is, what he stands for, how and where he gets his money from, and for what purposes.”
A notable difference between yourself and the people you criticize G. Remmy. Until we know how much skin you have in this game, every post is suspect IMO.
33 Terry M // Apr 25, 2012 at 8:18 pm
Chris, regarding who GR is, I couldn’t care less. I read what he’s saying, don’t care who he is. Let’s argue about that. You either agree or disagree with anyone’s comment. Nothing more to it. I found glissandos posts to be most of the time… Bang on! Say what you want, I would not start to find out why you saying it but what you have to say. Period.
34 Silly Season // Apr 25, 2012 at 8:30 pm
Fish gonna swim, birds gonna fly, politicians–regardless of ideology— gonna try to score points.
Ok, so if we don’t trust our local or provincial reps to negotiate on our behalf, what are the other options?
35 Chris Keam // Apr 25, 2012 at 9:20 pm
@Terry M
You are of course welcome to believe and agree with anyone (or their online persona). Personally, I think it’s naive. When someone engages in an anonymous, long-term propaganda campaign with clearly defined targets, I start to wonder why that is. I also think people have a right to know their accuser. Barring some very compelling reason to remain unidentified, I think it’s a bit gutless to make the comments Remmy has made, without being willing to subject him/herself to a equivalent level of scrutiny regarding motive and intent.
36 ThinkOutsideABox // Apr 25, 2012 at 9:56 pm
Related commentary from Wall Street Journal:
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/vancouver-wrestles-with-green-oil-tension-2012-04-26
(snip)
So far, nobody’s demanding an end to the shipping of petroleum products from Vancouver. It’s just a matter of how many.
Increasing oil shipments to one a day will certainly increase the possibility of a spill occurring. But, given strict Canadian oversight and enforcement, this seems quite manageable.
Vancouver Mayor Robertson may not like the idea of being an oil port, but, as some have pointed out, it already IS one. Coal and all kinds of other goods go under the Lion’s Gate Bridge daily, and some of those are also potentially hazardous. If you’re a gateway city, as Vancouver is, that goes with the territory. And after all, many oil tankers a week pass under the scenic Golden Gate Bridge.
Its port has long been a vital part of Vancouver’s economy. If you want a stark visual reminder of this, one of the first things tourists notice here are huge yellow piles just across the water from downtown Vancouver. It’s sulfur, a byproduct of oil sands production. It also comes from Alberta and is also loaded onto ships.
Again, Canada has strict federal maritime regulations and strictly enforces them. You hear of very few oil spills in Canadian waters.
And even though it happened not far from its coast, you can’t blame that Titanic deal on Canada.
37 Chris Porter // Apr 25, 2012 at 10:06 pm
100 Years of Non-Renewable Energy Disasters and Counting
http://www.counterspill.org/
38 spartikus // Apr 25, 2012 at 10:12 pm
MB: why aren’t they exporting oil sands products eastward to the other half of the country that imports oil from undemocratic countries in the volatile Middle East?
Why that’s a very good question.
TOAB: But, given strict Canadian oversight and enforcement, this seems quite manageable.
“Strict Canadian oversight”. I wonder if it’s related to “worthwhile Canadian initiative”.
Of course we don’t live Canada anymore. We live in Harper Government [tm], a place where environmental reviews are streamlined and oil spill response workers are moved from B.C. to Quebec.
Good thing too – a derailed locomotive is leaking oil into the St. Laurence as we speak.
39 mezzanine // Apr 25, 2012 at 10:24 pm
Rotterdam is another major port that handles a lot petroleum, yet has a vibrant urban centre close to it. Amsterdam, a smaller port to Rotterdam but much more famous, also has petroleum terminals. Those terminals feed into pipelines that serve the airport and deeper into germany.
Singapore, another compact urban centre, neither has oil production nor has a pipeline terminus, but petroleum storage and trading is a large component of its port activity. It will probably make MB’s head explode, but due to the lack of land, they are drilling large underground oil bunkers by their terminal.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/21/business/energy-environment/21iht-renoilstore21.html
vancouver would have been annexed by the USA a long time ago and be a small peripheral city if it wasn’t for the port and the CPR.
obviously, we must impose high standards and get a good deal from the companies for us to ship out the oil, but IMO enhanced oil delivery to vancouver and/or prince rupert can be done relatively safely, and enhance port activity.
40 Chris Keam // Apr 25, 2012 at 10:38 pm
In all seriousness, is there a single ocean that hasn’t had an oil spill? Seems to me we are dealing with when, not if, and to generalize somewhat, there’s a pretty spotty (pun intended) record on the success of clean-up efforts.
41 mezzanine // Apr 25, 2012 at 11:20 pm
^this seems to be site with stats, albeit industry-supported.
www(dot)itopf(dot)com.
In general spills from tankers, especially large ones, have decreased since the 1970s, despite a rise in petroleum shipping.
http://www.itopf.com/information-services/data-and-statistics/statistics/documents/Statpack2008_001.pdf
42 Max // Apr 26, 2012 at 7:29 am
I find it fascinating that Vision posts up an on-line petition in order to get their voice heard and yet just recently, 3,000 MP dwellers signed a petition with another 150+ lining up to speak against RIZE and Vision turned a blind ear. What is happening in the MP area has a direct impact on that neighborhood on a day to day basis…not a `what if `down the road.
All for money.
43 Max // Apr 26, 2012 at 7:30 am
Why isn`t Vision and this Mayor raising the flag about the yellow cake uranium that has tanked out of the area for yearsÉ
44 Richard // Apr 26, 2012 at 7:44 am
Seriously Max? Are you really not aware of the devastating impacts of oil spills on the environment, the economy and health? Try googling oil spills and brushing up on how bad they really are.
If you really were, I suspect you would be not making such comments.
45 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 9:17 am
@ Gliss 29:
So my question to you is, why do they waste city resources, time and money for a out of jurisdiction cause?
Because an oil slick doesn’t recognize jurisdictional boundaries.
Because Vancouver will be profoundly affected by even a moderate spill close to its jurisdictional boundaries.
Because jurisdictional boundaries are invisible in a real landscape wrought with wind and tides that push oil spills beyond multiple jurisdictional boundaries.
Because it’s his right as mayor to express opinions about issues that will potentially profoundly affect the area within his jurisdiction, as should any mayor, regardless of party affiliation.
Because there is direct evidence the Port of Vancouver is not prepared for an oil spill of even moderate proportions.
Because the federal government, whose jurisdiction includes the port beyond the harbour head line, has recently weakened the already-weak spill response organization.
46 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 9:24 am
@ Silly Season 32:
Fish gonna swim, birds gonna fly, politicians–regardless of ideology— gonna try to score points. Ok, so if we don’t trust our local or provincial reps to negotiate on our behalf, what are the other options?
Bang on.
47 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 9:48 am
@ Think 34, quoting the Wall Street Journal’s Marketwatch:
Vancouver Mayor Robertson may not like the idea of being an oil port, but, as some have pointed out, it already IS one.
First they use the common device known as a no-answer-answer: state the obvious.
Second, they cite all kinds of non-liquid oil products already shipped from Vancouver (sulphur) and inaccurately not from Vancouver (coal, which is shipped from Roberts Bank) and therein smugly avoid the real questions about:
(i) the radical expansion of liquid oil exports from Burrard Inlet;
(ii) the introduction of a new class of ship never seen in Burrard Inlet before;
(iii) the confining topographical structure of the Burrard Inlet, specifically First and Second Narrows; the latter will have to dredged; the former will likely require a high slack or ebbing tide for the passage of supertankers, which will limit their timetables, unless the industry decides to ignore optimum ship traversing conditions.
(iv) The lack of evidence that the Port of Vancouver is or will ever be ready for a major oil spill, certainly not from the initially inadequate performance during the moderate oil spill that resulted from a ruptured Kinder Morgan pipe under Inlet Drive just above the northern shoreline of Burnaby, and most certainly not with the recent federal cutbacks.
Lastly, the WSJ doesn’t care to adequately or fairly address the larger issues of climate change (oh oh, here come the deniers) and peak oil, and in fact have been a major mouthpiece for the “Clean Coal” proponents, so why would it be willing or even capable of addressing lesser concerns occurring in foreign ports?
48 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 10:04 am
@ Mezz 37:
It will probably make MB’s head explode … [oil is shipped from many ports]
While I do keep Ibuprofen handy, I’m perfectly OK with this conversation.
Besides, I’ve never said oil couldn’t be exported, but I question why we should consider such exports specifically in Burrard Inlet, and as a nation when there are glaring inadequacies in our national energy and environmental outlook.
Of course, these are national and international issues, while Frances iterates the local perspective. This is not an energy blog. I can get into it here if you want, Mezz (have make the time), but it’s not I who will need the Ibuprofen afterwards.
49 spartikus // Apr 26, 2012 at 10:04 am
I’m still a bit amazed at the vehemence displayed to what is, in essence, asking Kinder Morgan for a damage deposit.
One presumes those opposed feel it’s the City of Vancouver that should be financially responsible for an oil spill cleanup.
Yes? No?
And, you know, it’s not just Vancouver. Other Lower Mainland Mayors are also expressing hesitation.
I guess that makes Derek Corrigan…what? Pol Pot?
And we all know what happened to him.
And when Corrigan retreats to Burnaby Mountain to fight a protracted guerrilla war against the Coquitlam invader…we’ll only have ourselves to blame….
50 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 10:55 am
And, you know, it’s not just Vancouver. Other Lower Mainland Mayors are also expressing hesitation.
And there should be more than just two published mayoral opinions, Sparti.
Where do the other Metro mayors stand, especially those with salt water boundaries? If they want supertankers, then will they please spell out what benefits will occur within their jurisdictional boundaries?
It’s obvious some just wanna puff punch Gregor becasue their political On button is stuck in the closed position, like a cockroach continuing to go through the motions of screwing long after its mate bit off its head.
Don’t you see the giant blue screen at the city’s jurisdictional boundaries where nothing exists beyond except your dreams? Or are you having a kaleidoscopic Hollyhock vision of seals patrolling the piles of Canada Place? Of an active seaport sensitive to oily economic disruption? Of seabirds and intertidal life? Of Petro dollars?
Pity.
51 Glissando Remmy // Apr 26, 2012 at 11:19 am
Thought of The Day
“Vision Vancouver – Mining the pockets of Vancouver taxpayers since 2008!”
Not long ago, someone told me that the traditional Resource Based Industry in BC, is in trouble… I say, on the contrary, the industry with the biggest growth rate in BC, particularly in Vancouver, is… the Resourcefulness Mining Industry!
Lookie here:
http://www.vancourier.com/news/City+manager+Ballem+owns+salary+Vancouver+city+hall/6518222/story.html
And that’s one of the reasons why, Chris Keam, I will continue to criticize this administration.
After three years of naivete and incompetent management, at the hands of a no contest, hand picked management, this city is beaten into the ground.
The city has become unaffordable, no one but the people on the above list can afford the luxury of dreaming in this city. Period.
So, your Mayor wants to ban, LOL, Oil Tankers
crossing our waters, yes?
What else?
Cut the sugar out of cupcakes recipes?
No more deep fried chicken at KFC?
A maximum of two Starbucks coffee shops per street bloc?
Ban the Hydrogen molecules out the H2O found in most of the Vancouver lakes?
Funny stuff, eh?
Interesting thing is, that advocating against the Oil Takers, is advocating against the car, obviously, there is a war on cars taking place already in Vancouver, well, it’s more a war against the pockets of Vancouver taxpayers, tourists, but still…
I think your Mayor and his friends do not give a damn if the price for gas at the pump goes up to $3/L. You want to know why?
Because they are all, loaded!
Read that Vancouver courier article again.
But I know, they don’t discuss about money, around the dinner table, because they are all Lite Socialists, they don’t care about money… and that’s because, they always had the money!
Hypocrites!
It’s easy to preach more “Pay Parking Fees”, which btw amounted to $10 Mill more for the city last year, when you have an Expense Account and a fat Travel Allowance, right?
Quelle surprise! While he asks the average family to pay increased rates for a visit by car to Vancouver, your Mayor, an avid biker, an environmentalist, who rides a bicycle to news conferences and lives two kilometers from city hall, collects a $7,175 transport allowance ( in 2010). Which was… all of it!
As for the money men, hiding behind the tax sheltered lives of “philanthropy” and wireless, anonymous transfers, while financing political campaigns, please, don’t make me laugh.
MB,
“Because there is direct evidence the Port of Vancouver is not prepared for an oil spill of even moderate proportions.”
Add this one to your list…
“Because there is direct evidence Vancouver is not prepared for an Earthquake of even moderate proportions…”
What do you do, eh?
Build… smaller?
Maybe, that would be a good call.
But so far, based on this Council’s latest approval record, they did just the opposite!
“Because the federal government, whose jurisdiction includes the port beyond the harbour head line, has recently weakened the already-weak spill response organization.”
Petition them, then!
““Future generations deserve the same opportunities we have today to enjoy Vancouver’s treasured beaches, parks, and natural environment – especially Vancouver jewels such as Stanley Park,” said Commissioner Sharma.
What a load of bullshit!
Just FYI Sharma, there was no famine or avian flu that decimated The Stanley Park Children’s Zoo! Your Vision Vancouver pals sitting on the Vancouver Park Board did that for future generations. Last I heard they want a bicycle rental/ maintenance shop in there…
Sure thing, by the time Vision Vancouver pals are finished with “administering” this city… “future generations” would be already gone in search for other places where they could afford to live and raise a family.
All the house millionaires will be dead, what would they care, and their foreign replacements would be only living here part time, anyways.
Hollyhockers, on the other hand would be retired on their Cortes island, probably by then surrounded by a 10 ft wall to keep out the infidels.
Now, you two, just to be on the safe side, as a favor to me, could you start tearing down those Viaducts… we wouldn’t want the Tsunami to get them first!
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
52 F.H.Leghorn // Apr 26, 2012 at 11:20 am
@CK: “motive and intent” are, of course, fundamentally unknowable. If you are not interested in what GR has to say you are free to ignore him, just as I ignore you. Mind you, it’s pretty clear what your motive and intent are since you stick to the script ad nauseum.
Your life is presumably petroleum-free.
53 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 12:12 pm
@ Gliss 49
Add this one to your list…
“Because there is direct evidence Vancouver is not prepared for an Earthquake of even moderate proportions… What do you do, eh?
> The BC Building Code was already amended for seismic loading … not that it couldn’t use an update. New Vancouver civic buildings are usually built to higher standards than the Code.
> Are there not eathquake kits in every commnuity centre?
> Did not the COV spend tens of millions building a salt water pumping network (i.e. all the blue hydrants) in its densest parts designed specifically to fight fires after an earthquake knocks out the shallower city water system?
Not sure about preparedness training, but my guess it’s lax and has been so over every city administration that ever existed. Much of it is provincial (oh, that jurisdictonal thing again). We must keep in mind the feds scrapped its major West Coast army base in Chilliwack which would have been instrumental in helping the Lower Mainland after a major shake.
54 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 12:15 pm
@ Gliss 49
“Because the federal government, whose jurisdiction includes the port beyond the harbour head line, has recently weakened the already-weak spill response organization.”
Petition them, then!
I believe they already have, by, amngst others, the provincial minister, nonetheless.
Anything else?
55 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 12:20 pm
Gliss 49
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
“has jurisdiction over offshore waters – from the low water mark out to 12 nautical miles … etc.
So, that translates somehow to “Shuddup Gregor” even though Vancouver’s jusidiction is 1/1000th of one millimetre beyond the federal line?
You wish.
56 Max // Apr 26, 2012 at 12:26 pm
@Richard #42
You do realize that yellow cake uranium is somewhat,,,what is the word I am looking for…oh, yes, radioactive.
Considering Vancouver is declared as a nuclear free zone….
Do you know there is no uramium exploration in BC , yet it is tanked out of the province?
57 Glissando Remmy // Apr 26, 2012 at 12:34 pm
MB #51,
Re. Vancouver’s Preparedness for Earthquake
ROTFLMAO!
Call it whatever you want, all it is … city works at union wages, weekend overtime, the whole shebang!
Here, I don’t want even have to write it, I only have to copy and paste for your enjoyment , as I’ve already wrote before on this subject:
…………………………………………………………………
The Thought of The Day
“First – Extrapolation doesn’t count when you deal with earthquakes. Second – Preparedness works only if you sit on the top of your First Aid & Supplies Kit, if you have one, when the earthquake struck. Third – in the case the building you’re in, is falling on your head though, forget about the first two.”
Remember that nine years old stupid boy? And how he stepped over the ants’ nest in his parents’ backyard? And what did he do right after? He peed on it. Now, do you remember? I do. Earthquake and Tsunami – Ants’ size.
What did the ants do? Did they panic? Sure. They scattered every which way. Were they prepared for this? Nope. They thought they were. But later, they returned, counted their losses and start rebuilding.
Same here. Only with humans.
During my lifetime due to my parent’s travels and later due to my business travels, I found myself in the middle of three earthquakes. From 6.5 to 7.4 on the Richter scale. One was a normal dip-slip, the other two were strike-slip. Loss of life and wounded in all of them. A hundred or more of aftershocks in the 5ths on the Richter scale. Two of them happened during night time the third in the middle of the day. I experienced them in buildings on the 4th and on the 8th floors, the third one, I was walking down the street.
To this day I still remember in great detail the moments when all of them happen, the shake, the smells, the glass exploding, the wooden window frames screeching, the scared faces of the people around me, buildings wiggling like willow trees in the wind or shaking as they were possessed by demons, lampposts that almost touched the top of larger cars, and cars on the road with drivers oblivious to the fact that a quake was going on thinking that something went wrong with their car’s steering. The power (light) was the first to go. Communication with the outside world was second. Forget your cellphones. They rely on transmission towers too. In the darkness I could hear cabinets tilting over, I could feel framed pictures hitting my shoulder while falling to the floor, and bumping into people that were as scared as I was. During my second one and after witnessing the rug in the big office room moving like waves on a furious sea, I remember saying out loud ‘We’re F@*&d!’ Yap, that’s all I said folks, if I’m honest. Forget about what they say, that your life flashes in front of your eyes, a 64 frames per second movie of your life, grandpa and grandma, first kiss, first beer,.. It’s all pish. Good thing, the following day no one remembered what I’ve said.
‘We’re F*&*d!’ that was my philosophically best.
The interesting thing is all these earthquakes seemed to have something in common. They all started sudden, there was a powerful wind out of the blue noticed even from the inside of a well noise insulated building, than the wind died as if disconnected from a wind machine abruptly. A hallow sound coming from nowhere followed. For a couple of minutes there was quietness in the air. And then the shake started.
You want my two cents on the future of Vancouver? I don’t know what to say, I cannot predicted it and I can’t give it to you. As a matter of fact nobody knows. If someone tells you the opposite they are lying to you. Maybe the Vision boys can tell. Telling the future is their racket for they seem to know a lot of things in advance.
Anyhoo…
There are too many things to consider:
- Logistically speaking, the quake time, of either day or night, is important.
- Response time and access of the Emergency crews matters the most.
- You as a civilian being in the vicinity of a collapsed building don’t help. You can’t do Jack. Some creeps may take snapshots. That’s all.
- Distance from the Epicentre matters
- Depth at which the earthquake occurred is another important variable
- Duration (in seconds) of the tremor
- Type of the earthquake.
- Concrete frame, wood frame, old vs. new (I saw new houses collapsed due to bad construction)
MISCELLANEOUS:
Falling debris. Panic. Looting. Fire. Hysteria. Worry for the family members and friends you cannot reach. Lack of communication. Luck. You have to be F*&%g lucky! Now, do you feel lucky? Do you?
You have to take all the above into consideration. Add to that a tsunami as a possibility and if you’re trapped your odds are pretty glum. Basically your chances for survival are as good as the first Response Services are organized and on how the City’s Administration is prepared to deal with a calamity. Speaking of which, If it happens today, all I can say is…
’We’re F@*&*d!’
(Glissando Remmy – March 2011)
…………………………………………………………………
… anything else?
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
58 Silly Season // Apr 26, 2012 at 1:09 pm
@ Glissy
‘Sure thing, by the time Vision Vancouver pals are finished with “administering” this city… “future generations” would be already gone in search for other places where they could afford to live and raise a family.
All the house millionaires will be dead, what would they care, and their foreign replacements would be only living here part time, anyways.
Hollyhockers, on the other hand would be retired on their Cortes island, probably by then surrounded by a 10 ft wall to keep out the infidels’.
No one is going to let council off the hook when it comes to the affordability question. They won’t be able to divert all the attention to something else. That conversation is part of the whole economic picture that needs to be addressed here.
So, that said, is there an opportunity to create MORE employment HERE, with good-to-better-than-good wages, out of the current energy sector conversation we are having here? That along with the housing affordabililty issue, could create the conditions that mean that more people can LIVE and WORK in Vancouver? And PAY INCOME TAXES that have an opportunity to trickle back to us via the fed and provincial goverenments (now, THERE’S a project I think we could support, regardless of the regime in City Hall—more income tax money back to cities!).
I don’t want the Mayor and council to make blanket statements about “our brand” being destroyed (what, as a retirement village for the very well off?? As a housing development paradise, with no other major career opportunities?? As a tourist town, with low wages?? As a boring metro city, with only a few high end doughnut shopsand gourmet pulled pork food trucks to delite the locals?? ) without thinking through all the pros and cons involved in supporting–or not–supporting energy issues.
Unless they have their own magnificent plans to entice companies here, fund innovation, or create greater employment in this town–and so far, Vancouver Economic Development has been a huge FAIL in that regard—they will have to consider all opportunities—and not dismiss them out of hand.
By the way, I saw via Twitter that a $1.4 million dollar home sold here yesterday. The property tax on that? $5,900 per annum
How the hell can we exist on a city on property tax ? Can someone please show me how many crappy condos, in ugly buidlings we need to produce to ensure our infrastructure will be maintained–and grown?
This is all part of the larger equation of the overall economic equation and viability of the city—that we degrade and ignore (because we aren’t patient enuff? Smart enough?) by thinking in separate silos about Kinder Morgan, affordable housing, the environment and condos in our neighbourhoods.
It’s all inter-related, folks.
59 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 2:24 pm
Gliss 51
…………………….. Okay, you win the brass Shaker ring.
I once felt our 7-storey concrete sway, and my wife emerged very quickly from her bath when the water sloshed over the sides. Only two other jolts reside in my memory banks, one being when Mt St Helen’s blew just as I was about to light a cigarette. I quit smoking shortly after.
But you have to admit, the ability to fight fires in the inner city after a big one knocks out the power and water was a stroke of sound emergency planning. That idea came to the Engineering Dept. after the post-quake fires that raged for days in San Francisco in ’89.
However, this is supposed to be about oil and water, not earth and ash.
60 Max // Apr 26, 2012 at 2:36 pm
Speaking of Earthquake Preparedness, whatever happened to the report that was to be issued after 10 or so city employees spent a month in Christchurch, NZ after they were hit?
I mean, taxpayers dished out $100K + for that trip.
What did we gleen from that trip?
61 Tessa // Apr 26, 2012 at 2:41 pm
To all the people who think this is an economic boon to the city, what “good deal” is there to be had? An oil company wants to give us all the risk with virtually zero long-term jobs or economic benefit. Any benefit goes to Alberta or foreign, US or elsewhere, refineries, while we are forced to dredge the seabed to allow much larger ships carrying dangerous cargo to pass through a narrow, natural port. Yes, the chances of a spill have decreased through the years, but the chance remains and the price, if paid, is beyond severe. Also, we know what can happen simply from construction thanks to Burnaby.
That, and the problem isn’t just if the oil spills. The oil coming through that pipeline is an environmental disaster regardless of whether it spills or whether it’s simply burned and released as greenhouse gas emissions. The whole premise of a pipeline to allow for a huge expansion of the oil sands is moving in the wrong direction. It’s regressive, it’s not progress. It’s damaging to the BC economy in the long-run by adding to Canada’s already bad case of Dutch Disease and an overvalued dollar. And it’s environmentally destructive.
62 Glissando Remmy // Apr 26, 2012 at 2:43 pm
MB #57,
Now, I’m the one spreading the chills…
Sorry to bring this up, again, but when this kind of tragedy will hit Vancouver’s coast, the magnitude of the local damage will make Japan’s look like a kids play.
Tell you what…
Instead of throwing money into the BIG Empty (Vancouver Convention Centre West and its ‘grand’ Green Roof), into a BC Place Roof that’s as useful to Vancouverites as two Playboy centerfolds to a 90 years old fart; into a stupid two weeks party back in 2010, already long forgotten and a T-shirt with ‘I went to Vancouver Winter Olympics and all I’ve got left with is this pair of Red mittens’; instead of selling out BC Rail for scrap, same as we did with the BC Ferries, and also selling our water to foreigners maybe we should have looked at the future of this city and region with professionalism.
Most of the public school buildings in Vancouver are still standing due to… gravity, and paint. Not a chance in Hell.
The West End have become so crowded, the biggest damage will come from falling debris, especially the LOL “Vision” glass, fire and panic. The west side, parts of downtown and…the Olympic Village will wash their laundry in…public.
Far South, Richmond will become mush and you would wish not to be due for landing at the former YVR during the ‘happening’.
People in general, think they can put together the best evacuation plans and first aid schemes and bury the biggest pipes in the ground, earthquake proof, and it will still be good for Zip.
Living in a tremor zone is living like flies around a horse’s butt. One shake of the tail and we scatter any which way, then, for some reason we go back. Stupid.
At least the flies don’t have to work and save for the privilege…
Silly Season #56,
Exactly! “It’s all inter-related!”
63 Creek'er // Apr 26, 2012 at 3:03 pm
There is no benefit to BC of being a transportation point for unrefined bitumen. There is only a massive risk.
No benefit + huge risk = bad for BC
Unfortunately, we have no legal power to stop it under the division of powers.
64 F.H.Leghorn // Apr 26, 2012 at 4:05 pm
It’s quaint, really. Sound, practical reasons to limit the risk of spills by prohibiting pipeline expansion on the one hand and BILLIONS and BILLIONS of dollars invested in the tar sands by the world’s largest oil companies. Companies which, as history has shown, do whatever the hell they want to get the juice. It’s not always pretty, usually involves armed conflict, civil war or revolution or just bribing everyone in sight. I’m always amused by the Canadian belief that oil companies control other countries, but not ours.
Ottawa is talking about collecting $200 Billion in royalties, and then giving it to an American manufacturer of warplanes (the F-35 is Auschwitz with wings. Drones are cheaper and more effective).
I’m betting on Kinder Morgan.
65 MB // Apr 26, 2012 at 4:36 pm
Gliss 60 … maybe we should have looked at the future of this city and region with professionalism.
Totally with you there.
I’m no seismologist, but the 9+ ripper and 10+ metre tsunsamis will likely occur in the subduction zone 100 km off the West Coast of Van Isle and at the shoreline. If the fault lines a little closer to Vancouver stay zipped, then we may be able to ride it out.
Instead of throwing money into the BIG Empty (Vancouver Convention Centre West …
It was full of those big spenders — Trekies! — last weekend. I had a hard time avoiding getting slapped in the face by all the capes and jutting knobby Klingon forehead prostheses on the sidewalk outside.
But agree on the big spiky $600 million pillow.
66 Silly Season // Apr 26, 2012 at 4:47 pm
Regulation. Taxation.
Only for the marijiuna industry?
Is that going to be our default tax base?
67 mezzanine // Apr 26, 2012 at 5:06 pm
The supertankers proposed are a lot larger than anything we’ve had in Burrard Inlet before
…
the introduction of a new class of ship never seen in Burrard Inlet before;
I was under the impression that the pipeline will allow a current-sized tanker to be filled daily, compared to once every 3-4 days.
To all the people who think this is an economic boon to the city, what “good deal” is there to be had? An oil company wants to give us all the risk with virtually zero long-term jobs or economic benefit.
…
I’m still a bit amazed at the vehemence displayed to what is, in essence, asking Kinder Morgan for a damage deposit.
that sounds reasonable.
Correct me if i’m wrong, but I also found it interesting that CoV council is asking for that, instead of an outright moratorium on tanker traffic.
68 mezzanine // Apr 26, 2012 at 5:32 pm
….make that a moratorium on expansion to tanker traffic…
69 Michelle // Apr 26, 2012 at 6:43 pm
#15,29,49,55,60
Glissando’s strikes again.
I have to admit, by far, whenever you write Glissy, you produce some of the most compelling/ controversial comments.
Some people complain that they don’t know who you are. I read through your allegations and I found them to be quite remarkable, as most of them are true, and corroborated by secondary sources too.
So I don’t understand the ruckus. Who cares who delivers the message?
Frances should be glowing in delight as I’ve noticed that wherever you comment the number of comments triples.
In media talk… you sell!
Re. Oil tankers, what’s interesting is that the COfV is petitioning the Federal govmnt. as if they are private citizens, and not “government”. Wouldn’t be funny for the Federals to send them packing the same way Vision sent packing hundreds of opponents to the RIZE project?
That would be something.
Glissy, comment #55 was really scary and #60 left me trembling (despite the subject was not new) thinking that so many of our kids are in fact in danger, every time they go to school in these old classrooms. Btw, I found out from a different source that Vision’s Patti Bacchus might throw out her VSB appointment for a shot at a Provincial MLA job.
Speaking about caring for our kids… right! Uffff!
Ta da.
70 Chris Keam // Apr 26, 2012 at 9:15 pm
“Who cares who delivers the message?”
God I hope people aren’t actually this stupid and its just their slavish desire to agree with like-minded folks that has them making such a rookie mistake.
Double check the things your critics claim. Triple check the remarks of your (seeming) allies. You may be getting played like violin, by those who are using your beliefs to further their own ends.
@Leghorn:
Good stuff man. We need some levity in this thread before the planners start beating each other with their T-squares.
Gutsy to go with the whole “I’m commenting on the post I claim to have ignored, to say that I never read your posts” angle. If I didn’t know you were having us on, I might think it displayed a rather ill-thought-out comment.
71 Chris Keam // Apr 26, 2012 at 9:42 pm
“You do realize that yellow cake uranium is somewhat,,,what is the word I am looking for…oh, yes, radioactive.”
How radioactive Max? Isn’t it true that according to most hazardous materials handling guidelines, yellow cake is actually more toxic than radioactive? What are the handling guidelines if there are a spill? What type of PPE precautions are required? You know the answers to these questions right? You’re not just using yellow cake transportation as a boogey man I hope?
72 MB // Apr 27, 2012 at 10:00 am
@ Silly Season 30
I guess I don’t need to point out that Robyn Allan (as a President of ICBC, she made a lovely dancer) was appointed to that posting by the NDP?
Allan wrote a comprehensive 33-page review of three widely-quoted reports that unquestionably favoured oil sands crude exports over any other consideration. She defined the missing parts of their analysis, specifically the lax methodology used, unfounded assumptions (thence conclusions) made, and drew the results into the likely scenario that Canadian consumers are unaware of the large price hikes in Canadian fossil fuels that will result from this policy.
The exports are hinged on the assumption that they will receive the price mark ups the Chinese routinely make with most of their oil imports, without this higher revenue being passed to Albertans and Canadians, who own the resource.
Allan contends — and backs up with her own so-far uncontested analysis — that this will jack up the Canadian dollar, effectively making it a Petro Dollar in world financial markets, therein making our other exports too expensive (with its own economic impact), and as mentioned above, jacking the price at the pump of our own fuel.
That’s some way to treat our own people with our own resources. Like the issue of using Vancouver as a primary oil export port, who benefits at the expense of whom?
She also illuminated the huge chasm that exists in Canada’s own security WRT oil imports from unstable regions to half the country, and questioned why oil sands products weren’t meant to follow the most logical route eastward to offset these supplies which are (i) bought at the higher worldwide Brent price, and (ii) so easily disrupted.
I would add that with the latter scenario we’d create twens of thousands of Canadian jobs (refineries, construction …) as well as an opportunity to use the oil sands royalty (or a national carbon tax) revenues to lower oil dependency and emissions in our cities by implementing public transit, building compact transit-oriented urban development, electrifying ground transportation, developing renewable energy and buildig a national smart grid for its electricity, etc etc.
Allan’s reports and posts point directly at how the oil sands could be used more effectively within Canada, and make a much higher economic contribution on a national basis, and with a little imagination one can see how that can be multiplied several times over with deep green intiatives rather than greenwash.
The fact that she may have been an appointee of a particular political party to some crown corporation is of little consequence to her work.
73 Bill Lee // Apr 27, 2012 at 10:10 am
mezzanine // Apr 25, 2012 at 11:20 pm #41
See my comment 22 (had to jump the UCE wall of more than one external link in a posting) for a bunch of large oil (and other noxious chemicals) spills in the water.
It was waiting in abeyance for a few days until ‘une Canadienne errant’ Uber-editor Bula had a chance to verify the electrons.
http://www.francesbula.com/uncategorized/visions-ramps-up-opposition-to-kinder-morgan-pipeline-expansion/#comment-178490
Also your ITOP, but also the more inclusive list at IMO.org and the useful CEDRE.fr.
Some people might try the geographically nearby but exclusive NOAA site which even does floating barrels as well as hectolitres of loose petrocarbons.
Kinder Morgan is a U.S. company and based there.
You might look at the spider webs of others
Company name Market Capitlization
Kinder Morgan Energy P…27.92B
Enterprise Products Pa…45.79B
El Paso Corp 22.72B
Copano Energy, L.L.C. 2.54B
El Paso Pipeline Partn… 7.91B
Inergy Midstream LP 1.56B
Kinder Morgan Inc 28.76B
Enbridge Inc (USA) 32.26B
Williams Partners L.P. 17.42B
Energy Transfer Partne…10.80B
DCP Midstream Partners… 2.12B
Sector: Utilities > Industry: Natural Gas Utilities
More from Revere Data »
Description
Kinder Morgan Energy Partners, L.P. (KMP) is a pipeline transportation and energy storage company in North America. KMP owns an interest in approximately 29,000 miles of pipelines and 180 terminals. The Company operates in five business segments: Products Pipelines, Natural Gas Pipelines, carbon dioxide (CO2), Terminals and Kinder Morgan Canada. The Company’s pipelines transport natural gas, refined petroleum products, crude oil, carbon dioxide and other products. Its terminals store petroleum products and chemicals and handle products, such as ethanol, coal, petroleum coke and steel. The Company is also a provider of CO2. On July 1, 2011, the Company acquired from Petrohawk Energy Corporation both the remaining 50% interest in KinderHawk Field Services LLC and a 25% interest in EagleHawk Field Services, LLC. On December 15, 2011, the Company acquired a refined petroleum products terminal located on a 14-acre site in Lorton, Virginia from Motiva Enterprises, LLC.
74 Bill Lee // Apr 27, 2012 at 10:22 am
Dont forget the current federal budget omnibus bill includes:
“The new legislation says the government is eliminating the key provision in the act — section 35 (1), which says “no person shall carry on any work or undertaking that results in the harmful alteration, disruption or destruction of fish habitat.”
The new wording reads that “no person shall carry on any work, undertaking or activity that results in serious harm to fish that are part of a commercial, recreational or Aboriginal fishery, or to fish that support such a fishery.”
The government defines “serious harm” as “the death of fish or any permanent alteration to, or destruction of, fish habitat.” And the minister will make decisions on allowing harm to fish based on their “contribution … to the ongoing productivity of commercial, recreational or Aboriginal fisheries.”
Critics say the government is changing the law to make it easier for companies to advance major projects like Calgary-based Enbridge Inc.’s proposed $5.5-billion oilsands pipeline to the B.C. coast.
Read more: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/Controversial+revamp+fisheries+plum+pipeline+critics/6525786/story.html
75 MB // Apr 27, 2012 at 10:28 am
Chris Keam 70
@Leghorn: Good stuff man. We need some levity in this thread before the planners start beating each other with their T-squares.
Ha!
There aren’t many planners who design or build stuff, let alone weild an outdated T-square. They’re good at talking though, and being in a room full of them is sometimes like being in the centre of a flock of Canada geese.
The best ones are also architects, landscape architects or engineers, but such planner-designers are rare.
However, teaming up planners with said design professions in one room can be very, very dynamic — and not a T-square in sight amongst the mountains of freehand sketches on trace paper, CAD terminals and conference room full of half empty coffee cups and chattering planners, the occasional one leaping into the air to make a point.
76 Bill Lee // Apr 27, 2012 at 10:34 am
And it is the ships that “spill” usually not the pipelines, though that happens too.
See John Knox in the Victoria Times-Colonist on the number of tankers that go through the Juan de Fuca strait and split to Canada and the U.S. (Must be nice to have such a view from the Times-Colonist Tower)
“Also note that the oil tankers that routinely pass Victoria en route to refineries at Anacortes and Cherry Point, Washington, might carry 150 million litres of Alaska crude – almost four times as much as the Exxon Valdez spilled into Prince William Sound.”
Read more: timescolonist.com/news/oily+truth+strait+tankers+year/6522107/story.html
And we might keep watch on the The Pacific States – British Columbia Oil Spill Task Force web site and its Incident Response page.
“The Pacific States/British Columbia Oil Spill Task Force was authorized by a Memorandum of Cooperation signed in 1989 by the Governors of Alaska, Washington, Oregon, and California and the Premier of British Columbia following the Nestucca and Exxon Valdez oil spills.”.. [ more ]
“The Oil Spill Task Force will host the 2012 Clean Pacific Conference
The CLEAN PACIFIC CONFERENCE is the premier West Coast Training Event and Exhibition focused on oil, hazmat spill, planning, prevention and response. It will take place May 15-17, 2012 in Long Beach, CA. Our theme for 2012 will be “Tsunamis, Spills, Shipwrecks – Meeting Multiple Pacific Challenges.”"
And their annual report is up on their website this month. Amazing the variety of spills into water (or land).
And we must keep watch on North Vancouver’s Tsleil-Waututh Nation which opposes Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion and whose territory includes the Vancouver-Burnaby side of Burrard Inlet.
77 Heather Tailors // Apr 27, 2012 at 1:47 pm
This morning at 10 min to 6:00 AM, earthquake at 100 km from Vancouver, 4.5 on the Richter scale.
”
Glissando’s posts #57 #62 especially the “timing” are … interesting, to that respect. IMO!
“Now, I’m the one spreading the chills…
Right on… again!
78 Roger Kemble // Apr 27, 2012 at 2:14 pm
“However, teaming up planners with said design professions in one room can be very, very dynamic — and not a T-square in sight amongst the mountains of freehand sketches on trace paper, CAD terminals and conference room full of half empty coffee cups and chattering planners, the occasional one leaping into the air to make a point.”
Hey MB @ #75 my team uses 21stC shiny gadgetry and I still use a T-square . . .
http://theyorkshirelad.ca/New.Nanaimo.Center/cultural.event/cultural.event.html
. . . and I paint too. So get this, architect/planner/artist/sailor/bon vivant/full coffee cups . . .
so put that in your pipe and smoke it.
I’m dead against VLST’s plying the narrows, though, ‘cos I’ve sailed them both and the tides are deadly. It’s a tragedy waiting to happen.
But until we get out of our cars (I haven’t owned one since 1984: richer and happier for it) and stop using plastic bags on a whim its going to be difficult.
79 Glissando Remmy // Apr 27, 2012 at 10:03 pm
LMAO!
Heather Tailors #77,
Have you read the Wizard of Oz?
Doesn’t matter.
So, one day, a few years back, I got caught in this nasty tornado in Kansas. As I flew through the air at incredible speed, a Dairy cow went by me. I managed to catch on to her tail…
After a few minutes we both crashed on top of a police station, me on top of her teats…
Have to say, that was my freshest milk-shake, ever!
A traffic cop, ticketed both of us for littering.
There.
Let’s see what happens next.
80 Silly Season // Apr 28, 2012 at 1:43 am
@MB #72
And I would not hesitate to point out another party’s political appointee, who might be making supportive comments about crude versus gas prices.
I know that Allen is an economist, but I am unclear that she really has a broad background in energy policy and pricing, both in relation to worldwide and the local market.
I certainly am interested in what she has to say, but I have to understand what she is saying—and on what basis she comes to her conclusions. Her statements are very definitive and I wonder about how immersed she is in this particular subject.
Now, I’ve read what you have posted, and appreciate seeing the argument presented in a fairly simple away (or, at least, in a simple enough way that I understand her POV).
As a non economist myself, I am especially interested in her claim of “the likely scenario that Canadian consumers are unaware of the large price hikes in Canadian fossil fuels that will result from this policy”.
There is also a reference and I believe a supposition in her arguments that refining crude into gasoline here will automatically mean lower prices at our local pumps.
While I would love to have that bear out since I am a proponent of as much “value-added’ that we can squeeze out of our own resources (including more job creation) , I believe the world markets have a rather large part to play in determining price.
So, in the interest of seeing what someone else says about pricing, here is something from Andrew Leach, a professor, economist and environmental resource researcher at U of A:
“Since refiners can sell their product in higher priced markets, they won’t sell locally at a discount, and so margins increase. Obviously, over time, gasoline prices track world crude oil prices very closely – they just don’t necessarily track local ones. Think about this before you decide that blocking export pipelines and stranding crude in Canada, which will lead to a discounted Canadian crude oil price, will translate to savings at the pump in Canada’.
Here’s a look at his blog piece on pricing:
http://andrewleach.ca/oilsands/local-crude-prices-vs-local-gas-prices/#more-972
I think what I liked about this piece was, that from the outset, he criticized the Government of Alberta’s own forecast on the revenue side, stating that “all oil forecating is wrong” .
I guess I am just naturally attracted to that approach
(An exploration of Leach’s own bona fides in this area of practice is on the blog; I leave it to readers to determine his academic credentials as well as any conflicts).
The refinery business interests me too. My first reaction: of course we want to do it all here! Why would we ship it out THEN buy it back at the processed price? Or, why wouldn’t we try to refine and sell to other markets (the US, for instance).
Well, because our own buy-back for our own needs of processed from the original amount shipped would be relatively small. Thus, the greatest amount of revenue to Alberta (and therefore hopefully to any other goverenemnts or levels of governments that may be acomodating the province) is the raw material.
And could we compete against other world processers, were we to look for markets for our processed oil? Remember, this is a world market pricing we are talking about. Is manufacturing gas from bitumen in Canada like trying to mmanufacture mas quantities of textiles, for instance? With labout and other costs, how would we compete with refineries in China?
Even if we did have a ‘Petro dollar” are we in a position to dominate the market and dictate prices into the foreseeable future when product is coming from other corners of the globe?
And is refining, even just for our own use, worth it in every sense of the word.
I would love it if someone could make the case for it…but, in looking at this, at this point, it seems the greatest revenue spread opportunityy, lowest production costs are in shipping raw materials.
Here’s another way to think of it. Would we be nationalistic enough to pay a higher gas price, in order to support the refining of oil here?
It seems to me, that so far, there is a natural order at work her, that is is kind of orderly. Some countries are lucky enough to be producers. Some are refiners. They make their maximum profits at different levels of the supply chain. It all depends on who does what really well, and most efficiently.
And of course, this dissertation hasn’t even touched on the environmental aspects of the whole program.
(If I had to take a guess, as of today, btw, I’d say based on the conversations I hear from other lay people, the pr so far, and sense of basic understanding of the Enbridge Pipeline, Keystone and the Kinder Morgan projects, that Keystone and possibly Kinder Morgan could be a go, while Enbridge would not. It seems a clever play to have so much going on, both internally and externally. There’s some intresting poker playing going on, on so many fronyts. Would the electorate—and even enviro groups—be able to turn it all down? Of course, I could be wrong…;-)
Planning. Risk. Planning. Mitigation. Planning. Rewards.
Can any of it be done?
Meanwhile, people have to also labour over alternatives in energy, innovation, and economic opportunity. Where are these, who is supporting them, and how close to market might they be?
But if anyone can figure it all out, it will be posters to this blog!
Goodnight, all.
81 Mira // Apr 28, 2012 at 11:00 am
Silly Season #80
Excellent! Well said.
“Planning. Risk. Planning. Mitigation. Planning. Rewards.
Can any of it be done?
Meanwhile, people have to also labour over alternatives in energy, innovation, and economic opportunity. Where are these, who is supporting them, and how close to market might they be?
But if anyone can figure it all out, it will be posters to this blog!”
I especially liked the ending.
It seems to me that the people leading us, at all levels, in this province, have no time left to think. They (like Mayor Robertson and Vision for example) only have time for “advocating”, “making loud noises”, stirring the crap —->>> WITH-NO-SOLUTIONS in sight!
No consultation, no research, nothing! Pile on!
Doing what “environmentalists”. all US charity funded, have been doing for decades. Taking Canadian business away form Canadians and gifting it to the Americans. Was I clear enough?
82 Sean Bickerton // Apr 28, 2012 at 11:26 am
Greenpeace was born here largely from the desire to stop oil tankers from plying the dangerous waters of the Inside Passage.
Forty years later, we have the educational advantage of Exxon Valdez and the BP Gulf spill to remind us of the serious risks involved.
Time and again, oil companies have rebuffed critics while ignoring safety to the point of criminal neglect despite all warnings from within and without, and have repeatedly refused to provide the bare minimum of cleanup resources called for in the safety “plans” submitted for review.
The Mayor is absolutely right to insist a worst-case scenario is prepared for and that all necessary resources in manpower and materiel are made available and staged here in advance as part of any approval process.
I wish they could go further.
Vancouver and its environs will assume all of the risks to its environment. So why aren’t the profits being shared as equally as the risks?
A few temporary construction jobs are a pittance, given the profits to be realized.
Where is the legacy fund for BC? Or the contributions to the arts in BC, now the lowest funded per capita in Canada?
If those advocating this project looked at it from the risk/benefit perspective of Vancouver, they would be urging the proponents to take these steps on their own as a bare minimum for approval.
Instead we’re reduced to the usual clown wars …
Good on the Mayor for looking out for our interests. That’s his job.
83 Silly Season // Apr 28, 2012 at 11:58 am
That’s one of my points, @Sean.
Risk/benefits for those being asked to shoulder the big loads. Absolutely, that it goes beyond infrastructure jobs.
But we can’t avoid that big convesations. What are the alternatives they might suggest?
One point I forgot to include: we can put up expert vs. expert forever, and forever be spinning our wheels.
“All games gave been played, all possibilities considered, and now conflicts just provoke the usual contradictions. Thus they once again try out a new outlandish game—and declare themselves to be an experiment.”
(from producers’ liner notes from ‘Cocoon Dance’, co. ERASGA dance company
@Mira
I don’t disagree that pols seem to often go for the low-hanging fruit when it comes to choosing rhetoric over considered action.
If it’s a “no”, then again, what are the alternatives they propose? For environmental safeguards. For spurring economic growth?
For creating jobs in other than the construction and tourism sectors?
84 Chris Keam // Apr 28, 2012 at 1:08 pm
“Greenpeace was born here largely from the desire to stop oil tankers from plying the dangerous waters of the Inside Passage.”
The organization was formed in response to plans for nuclear testing in the Aleutian Islands.
85 Glissando Remmy // Apr 28, 2012 at 2:02 pm
Thought of The Day… Redivivus
“A Pseudo-Mayor and a Pseudo-Council for a Pseudo-Cause in a Pseudo-Jurisdiction.”
Sean #82, please read my post #31, carefully… the quotations are from here:
http://files.greenshores.ca/IssueSheets/GSJurisdictionIssueSheet_finalVer4.pdf
I remember that last November, you wanted to become a politician.
Politicians are not supposed to be vaudeville amateurs, like what we have now in office, here in Vancouver, but people who at least know how to interpret the laws of the land.
Very disappointing.
Just like when Affleck and Ball joined Vision and voted against community’s wishes (RIZE Development) are you telling me now, that you’ve decided to practice the mantra “if you can’t fight them… join them”?
How pitiful.
No. It’s not the Mayor’s job, it’s Stephen Harper’s job and to some degree, Christy Clark’s job.
And let me ask you this.
Considering how the Vision & NPA Council members + Mayor sent the hundreds of people that opposed that Rize thingy, waaaay… packing, you wouldn’t mind when the Federal government, after spending bagful of monies to respond to this idiocy, will send this “government” packing?
Some people in office are playing “Miss Vancouver” with taxpayers money, Sean, and they know it!
And one other thing…
LMAO!
Local Government petitioning against the Federal Government?
Wasn’t that supposed to be The People vs. The State?
Local Government against “Higher” Government, IMO, is not only like shooting yourself in the “Local” foot, but it’s stupidly unnatural.
But hey, with this Vision cartel, there seems to be a new start for everything.
Lights, Music, Snowflakes…
Send in the Clowncilors!
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
86 mezzanine // Apr 28, 2012 at 2:05 pm
A few temporary construction jobs are a pittance, given the profits to be realized.
I’m no expert, but IMO there would be a few more economic benefits than a few temporary construction jobs. A permanent crew of support workers for one, and this would be of benefit along the rural areas of the Kinder Morgan line as well as the port. Oil terminal workers at the port would be high-skilled, high paying jobs. More of contention would be how much new value-added work we can get from terminal expansion (eg, a hub of skilled workers, experience and support industries being able to build on itself).
On a bigger picture, the Port of Vancouver would be more important to world supply chains. If vancouver is able to ship more oil, and do it safely, the port and the city would be even more interconnected with the world and its economy and have more prominence.
87 Michelle // Apr 28, 2012 at 2:53 pm
Chris Keam #70
Darling, next time please call the ladies in your life “stupid” not me! OK?
This was you:
“God I hope people aren’t actually this stupid and its just their slavish desire to agree with like-minded folks that has them making such a rookie mistake.
This was me:
“Who cares who delivers the message?”
Didn’t change my mind either!
Ta da.
88 Chris Keam // Apr 28, 2012 at 3:38 pm
“No. It’s not the Mayor’s job, it’s Stephen Harper’s job and to some degree, Christy Clark’s job.”
I wonder how many families are grateful to Philip Owen for helping save their loved ones lives by ignoring jurisdictional boundaries, defying federal drug policy, and supporting harm reduction?
“Darling, next time please call the ladies in your life “stupid” not me! OK?”
I paint what I see Sugar.
89 Terry m // Apr 28, 2012 at 4:37 pm
In all fairness Chris @88 you should have pasted this as well:
“Considering how the Vision & NPA Council members + Mayor sent the hundreds of people that opposed that Rize thingy, waaaay… packing, you wouldn’t mind when the Federal government, after spending bagful of monies to respond to this idiocy, will send this “government” packing?”
And then this:
“LMAO!
Local Government petitioning against the Federal Government?
Wasn’t that supposed to be The People vs. The State?
Local Government against “Higher” Government, IMO, is not only like shooting yourself in the “Local” foot, but it’s stupidly unnatural.
But hey, with this Vision cartel, there seems to be a new start for everything.”
Now we leveled the field. I don’t think Glissy will be mad for quoting him.
90 Silly Season // Apr 28, 2012 at 4:48 pm
Ummm…OK.
Well, continuing on, here’s an oped on building a refinery here. Interesting BIG infrastrucure numbers, though no discussion about competive pricing.
“We have the resources, the natural proximity to ports, rail infrastructure and voracious customers south of the border and within 36 hours of our export terminals. All it takes is vision, capital, know-how, tenacity and chutzpah. And a big bold plan.’
http://opinion.financialpost.com/2011/11/04/instead-of-pipelines-build-refineries-here/
Which seems to be pointing in the direction of exporting to the States, rather than to China. Which would perhaps take us away from a multi-customer model, which I believe is the leverage we possess now for having our potential customers “play nice” with us in terms of helping us mitigate risk in several areas.
Anyway, have at ‘er, folks!
91 Silly Season // Apr 28, 2012 at 4:54 pm
Sorry, that should read: “a multi-customer model”.
Really, it’s not my spelling that’s the problem. It’s my typing!
Is there a WordPress program that allows one to spell check before submitting? I have to deduct marks from my own arguments because my opus’s LOOK sloppy!
Can you please consider a preview window, Frances?
92 Silly Season // Apr 28, 2012 at 4:55 pm
“Opuses”.
Crap.
Sigh.
93 Sean Bickerton // Apr 29, 2012 at 11:27 am
@ Chris Keam #84.
Hi Chris, nice to hear from you.
I was at the Amchatka demonstration in Peace Arch Park – my best friend and I skipped junioir high to attend, and ended up closing those gates as part of that demonstration before having to high-tail it out of the park …
But that was not a Greenpeace event, it was just the first time a massive environmental cohort had come together in opposition, and it turned out that the founders of Greenpeace were all there and met each other.
So Greenpeace got its impetus from Amchatka, but the group was formed to to organize opposition to oil tankers coming down the inside passage.
94 Silly Season // Apr 29, 2012 at 1:31 pm
The pre-cursor to Greenpeace was “The Don’t Make A Wave Committee” which sprung up after the 1969 demonstration that Sean writes about.
Those on that committee were the founding members of the organization (Bohlens, Stowes, Metcalfe’s, Paul Cote, Bob and Bobbie Hunter, supported by Patrick Watson and Patrick Moore) that would later evolve in 1972 into ‘Greenpeace’ .
‘The Don’t Make a Wave’ committee bought a boat, the Phyllis MacCormack, and renamed her “Greenpeace” for the sail up to Amchitka to protest the nuclear testing off Alaska, in 1971. That’s probably why some think ‘Greenpeace’ was always the name of the group.
I do think nuclear proliferation, over-fishing the oceans and the seal hunt were the focus of Greenpeace’s agenda for the first decade, at least.
I’m not sure about dates around protesting tankers down our shores or what part Greenpeace, but I do remember there was significant controversary around the prospect, back in the day.
One thing I do know: Bob Hunter would have been delighted to know that Bimini’s on 4th Ave. has reopened!
That man was one of the most delightful, erudite and greatest story tellers of our time.
It was a privlege to hear to him speak, when he and some other terrific writers and journalists of the day came by my then place of work, to gossip, bs and swap tales.
95 jolson // Apr 30, 2012 at 11:22 am
oil??????
In respect to the current topic, I observe that on this planet humans are having a huge impact on the biosphere. We probably need to change this situation but we cannot make progress on solving this issue without new ideas. Stopping a pipeline expansion proposal is not a new idea and will not solve the underlying problem even if it is successful. Rather than pursuing this course…………………..
We might say for example that we need to spend some portion of oil revenue on reducing demand for this commodity by switching vehicles to electron infrastructure. Start a new manufacturing industry.
We might say we need funding support for re-tooling to clean industry in our manufacturing sector.
We might say we will protect our air quality by developing, manufacturing and supplying portable clean power technology for anchored ships. Start a new business.
We might say that all ship movement shall be GHG neutral, thereby spurring a renaissance in tug propulsion technology, exported across the planet, everybody needs it.
We might say we will supply low cost clean shore power for ships at dock.
We might say that we will train and equip emergency response teams with oil revenues.
We might say that we need to spend some portion of oil revenue on all of these ideas.
These ideas are at the scale needed for the transformation of our industrial and transportation sectors where by in the future they are based on renewable energy sources, the day we don’t need a pipeline.
96 MB // Apr 30, 2012 at 11:31 am
Silly Season 80, thanks for your evocative post.
Robyn Allan’s analysis illuminates the fact that the Chinese heavily subsidize their petroleum imports, first by paying a per barrel premium on oil to secure supplies, then on insulating their refineries from paying even the world price plus that premium. Allan carried that premium through to the oil sands exports specifically to China, and calculated it will result in increased inflation at home as the years go by. The producers want to capture this markup and ignore the domestic market, with, perversely, the help of the federal government which is greasing the rails.
The oil sands are already a non-conventional source of petroleum that costs more to produce and takes a lot more energy to extract and upgrade, thus it is a more expensive product that has a much lower net energy than conventional oil. Conventional oil from the world’s cheaper and easier to get at supergiant fields has been in decline since 2006. We are riding a plateau made possible by the Drill Baby Drill! expensive unconventional sources with less net energy like the oil sands, shale and deep sea. The supergiants still make up about 65% of the total worldwide oil supply, but there is an approaching steeper decline and supply crisis that the world is not prepared for, least of all Canada. There is no evidence that the unconventional alternatives will make up for the decline or offset potentially steep increases in prices. Further, conservation and renewable energy even on a wide scale will only go so far, and will not prevent entirely an overall worldwide energy shortfall.
One of the greatest assumptions ever made was that economic growth will continue (or is even possible) when the energy that it is founded on becomes far more expensive (it has already increased in price by about 400% over the last decade and is steadily eroding per barrel net energy) and starts showing signs of supply interruption, whether by depletion of conventional sources, by conflict in oil-producing areas, or by export agreements by oil-producing nations that ignore our own energy security.
One of the best sources of information on this stuff I’ve found is posted by professionals on The Oil Drum @ http://www.theoildrum.com
Andrew Leach’s comment that banning exports and “… blocking export pipelines and stranding crude in Canada …” is a bit either / or. In fact, no one is talking about blocking all exports; there is a credible and massive discomfiture with exporting crude through jurisdictions that are expected to take all the risks, or where aboriginal consultation remains inadequate under the broad requirements made by the Supreme Court (Delgamuukw), but that doesn’t mean that US exports won’t arise again. The environmental concerns are completely legit.
We are obligated under NAFTA to export a certain percentage of the oil to US markets, and that was also criticized in the past for similar concerns over Canada’s own energy security. Under NAFTA eastern Canada gets ignored. Under Enbridge and Kinder Morgan, eastern Canada gets ignored. However, Kinder Morgan has a very flexible export potential. They could choose to ignore Vancouver and let the oil flow to Bellingham and California for refining and export.
“The refinery business interests me too. My first reaction: of course we want to do it all here! Why would we ship it out THEN buy it back at the processed price? Or, why wouldn’t we try to refine and sell to other markets (the US, for instance).”
You then reiterate that the buy-back for the domestic market is small. While true, there are other reasons that several refineries should be seriously considered if not by the oil companies, then by the federal government. As mentioned before, Canada doesn’t have a Strategic Petroleum Reserve (i.e. an energy savings account) designed for the day the world price spikes again and again (read above). Nor does it have an industrial jobs creation strategy where refined Canadian oil products are exported from eastern Canada, therein reversing the flow. Peak oil will arguably stimulate prices far beyond that any tax or modest premium paid on domestic oil. Yes, planning for it is extremely important, but this hasn’t even begun yet.
With respect to cushioning our oil and car-dependent cities from what could be the profound economic blows of peak oil, and lowering our domestic emissions, how will that be funded? A modest carbon tax on domestic fossil fuel exports and consumption will provide a more certain and democratic tax spread, and the revenue should be devoted entirely to transit, a made-in-Canada clean energy R&D and development initiative, conservation, rebates for low-income citizens, et cetera. Then, Canada can justifiably promote international climate change initiatives from a standpoint of having done it internally rather than exploiting, exporting and expanding carbon under a gold rush mentality where “value added” is routinely dismissed along with the notion that fossil fuels can be considered a useful bridge to a renewable energy future.
97 Roger Kemble // Apr 30, 2012 at 12:18 pm
Sillyseason @ #91
1. Open a Word document.
2. Compose your stuff.
3. Go to spell check.
4. Correct spelling.
5. Review your stuff.
6. Okay.
7. Copy and load to text window.
8. Press Submit.
98 Silly Season // Apr 30, 2012 at 12:31 pm
@MB #96
Thank you, for your ever thoughtful analysis and information on this subject.
Re: Chinese subsidies (and the effect that may have on our domestic gasoline prices). Any idea if this is coming up in trade negotiations? Also, are we in a position to sell our crude to them on a spot market, versus long term contracts–or a combination of both? And, would that help or hinder us in the end?
I don’t disagree that the unfettered growth we have experienced won’t slacken due to energy shorfall/shortages. These are finite natural resources.
That’s why I would like to know if there is a world body for alternative energy innovation and coordinated developemnt that actually has governements sitting up and listening. Not too happy with the thought that we could face a “Mad Max”-like future. And not quite buying into the notion that space mining is viable!
Again with regards to refining here, I am open to the possibility of refining for our own domestic use, at least, but given the costs, would think that we need to export as well. (I did pop another opinion on this issue at #90).
As for enviro concerns, native inclusion and other arguments about regulations, taxation possibilities,jobs, etc, and how it will benefit our province, I am onboard with all that.
IMHO, this apparent “sudden rush/sell job” –as per the recent BC Business Council event I attended set my teeth on edge.
To our governments and producers and buyers: Give us the info, put your money where your mouths are with billions dedicated to safeguarding us, give us stucture, give us regulations with teeth in them, give us forward plans when the oil runs out, show us the money and how it benefits average British Columbians and Canadians, in the form of programs and prosperity—give us A PLAN!
If you can’t, sorry, I can’t buy this on “good faith” alone.
99 Silly Season // Apr 30, 2012 at 12:46 pm
PS.
And I challenge those—including our own city council— who are vehemently opposed to all the energy projects, to let us know what their alternatives are, in industry sectors and innovation, to grow the provincial and local economies.
Because I’m not sure that property taxes, high end shoe shops and restaurants should be counted on to provide the revenue and jobs needed to support our burgeoning infrastructure and programming needs.
100 MB // Apr 30, 2012 at 1:23 pm
Silly Season 98
To our governments and producers and buyers: Give us the info, put your money where your mouths are with billions dedicated to safeguarding us, give us stucture, give us regulations with teeth in them, give us forward plans when the oil runs out, show us the money and how it benefits average British Columbians and Canadians, in the form of programs and prosperity—give us A PLAN!
Amen!
And I challenge those—including our own city council— who are vehemently opposed to all the energy projects, to let us know what their alternatives are, in industry sectors and innovation, to grow the provincial and local economies.
You’ve made an important distinction that I hope others will see if they’ve managed to slog through thus far: that this is about issues, not just about poltical personalities like Gregor.
The mayor needs to define a better industrial / economic strategy, but his stance on oil & water does succeed in placing the spotlight on the issue.
101 MB // Apr 30, 2012 at 1:25 pm
Roger 97
Hey, those are pretty complicated instructions for a guy who still uses a T-square!
|;-)
102 Roger Kemble // Apr 30, 2012 at 1:33 pm
I”da thought Silly Season wooda thought that one thru!
SS deserves all he gets . . . as the lady said “go live in the Amazon!
103 Silly Season // Apr 30, 2012 at 1:54 pm
@ Roger Kemble.
#97 Of course! *bonks own forehead with hand* I have done that in the past. Duh. As with many things in life, the best, most ‘elegant’ solutions are often the easiest ones.
As for “deserves all he gets”, that’s pretty funny, on several different levels.
I propose that you and MB both attend the next ‘FABula’ beer fest.
I’d like ta size both ye boyz up, with me gimlet eye…arghhhh.
104 Silly Season // Apr 30, 2012 at 1:59 pm
@Roger K.
Didn’t formally note your egregious, satirical (??) spelling errors on that last one.
Duly…noted. (I do wish I had stayed on and earned all my credits from ‘Miss Faversham’s School of Industrial Typing”).
105 Silly Season // Apr 30, 2012 at 2:01 pm
PS @Roger Kemble
‘SS deserves all he gets . . . as the lady said “go live in the Amazon!’
That, my dear, would indeed be the sound of 1,000 monkeys, banging away on 1,000 typewriters…shurely.
106 Glissando Remmy // Apr 30, 2012 at 5:22 pm
Thought of The Afternoon
“More I read about this Kinder Morgan pipeline controversy, more I think of Kinder chocolate eggs and Captain Morgan rum.”
Now I’m having a sugar craving, for all the wrong reasons.
Enough.
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
107 Sean Bickerton // May 1, 2012 at 11:16 am
Hi Glissy!
Thought I’d wait until this thread died down a little before responding. You don’t have to worry – I haven’t gone over to the dark side – but I’ve never left my own values and concern for the natural world around us has always been part of my life.
108 Bill Lee // May 1, 2012 at 2:54 pm
Did anyone notice in the Glorious Workers’ Day edition of the Globe and Mail, May 1, 2012, that Madame Bula of this salon found that Robertson and Vision was full of [beautiful solar-heated and expelled much-more-than-warm air] today?
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/british-columbia/robertson-seeks-to-protect-vancouver-from-increased-tanker-traffic/article2418663/
…”But while the mayor and his council are demanding the industry take full responsibility for spill cleanups, it turns out the industry already does – and has for years.”
““Tankers are required to have insurance to pay for a cleanup. They also have to have an agreement with a local oil-spill response company,” said Yoss Leclerc, the harbourmaster and director of operations and security for Port Metro Vancouver.”
“As well, he said, if a ship’s insurance isn’t sufficient to pay for all the costs, there’s an international fund set up that covers the difference – something like an underinsured motorist’s insurance provision.
And, failing all else, the Canadian Coast Guard is the lead agency responsible for any cleanups that aren’t covered by the above, he said.”
Hmm.
And will our cycling Bürgermeister go to Brazil for the Rio +20 Conference [ United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development], in late June for saying Vee are Green, Wee are Green and other chants of the Vision Vancouver to which we are forced to belong to.
Shots of Robertson in his Speedo swimsuit in Rio’s beaches will grace the next tired Vision pamphletizing. Shall we tell him that ANP had said Monday April 9th 2012 that oil was discovered seeping from cracks near the Roncador field, about 120 kilometers off the coast of Rio de Janeiro state? The Campos Basin produces more than 90% of Brazil’s crude oil.
109 spartikus // May 1, 2012 at 3:01 pm
In Frances’s latest article on this in today’s Globe, a Port official states tankers are already required to have insurance.
As far as I can tell, here is the relevant part of the Canada Shipping Act:
Notice what’s missing? A required $$$ for said insurance, perhaps?
While there is a requirement to have an agreement with a “response organization” to handle a spill up to a “prescribed maximum quantity” what happens if, you know, the spill exceeds the “prescribed maximum quantity”.
For example, if one tanker hits another and both leak. How big a spill can the current response organizations in the Lower Mainland handle?
And nothing is mentioned about the pipeline end of this.
Seems all a bit loosey-goosey to me.
110 spartikus // May 1, 2012 at 3:02 pm
@Bill Lee: Jinx!
111 spartikus // May 1, 2012 at 3:12 pm
I suddenly remembered my friend in the UK is “in the biz”
Their response to my query for info:
112 Paul T. // May 1, 2012 at 3:37 pm
Wow, this is quite amazing.. I love how all the people who posted in the past about their hatred of people who are “NIMBYs” are now becoming exactly the same people. I don’t want oil in my city! I don’t want tankers in my city!
Good grief.
Fact: By virtue of our natural composition Port Metro Van has one of the safest shipping lanes on the West Coast of the Continent.
Fact: The Lions Gate bridge is constructed so high to accommodate shipping.
Fact: Port Metro Van sees over 3000 ships per year arrive.
Fact: On a yearly basis, those ships carry over 30 million metric tonnes of coal, 11 million metric tonnes of fertilizer and over 9 million metric tonnes of other chemicals.
Any of those ships losing some or all of their cargo would have horrible environmental implications.
When you look at the estimated 100 or 200 more oil tankers a year leaving our port, that’s only 3 to 6% more ships.
So this is not about the environment vs. the economy. If we wanted to save the environment, we’d just shut the port down. But no one wants to do that.
This is a fight that I suspect Vision is spearheading because their radical environmentalist donors are forcing them to do it. They do not care about Canada’s financial well-being. They do not care that (as Frances mentions) it takes oil/gas to run the modern, indeed to make bicycles.
113 Bill Lee // May 1, 2012 at 4:27 pm
@spartikus // May 1, 2012 at 3:01 pm #109
Browse the graphic below for over 10,000 tonne spills [ 1 short ton (2000 lbs) = 0.90718 tonne or the metric ton which is 1000 kilo. ]
Diesel fuel oil 20 to 60 at 15ºC has a density of 0.820 to 0.950 kg/L
A good average value might be Diesel oil 40 at 15ºC with a density of 0.850 kg/L
1 metric ton = 1000 kg. 1000 kg / 0.850 kg/L = 1176.47 liters of diesel.
1000 litres is a cube 1 metre per side, 1.3 cubic yards.
Aha, now spread it thin and you get an enormous area and a change in surface tension and water chemistry.
Chart and Data
The Largest Oil Spills in History, 1901 to Present
http://chartsbin.com/view/mgz
Somewhat hidden on first view is their “References and Data Table” which you can see as a below-image button that expands the data table.
Note the usual sources IOPTF, Cedre.fr etc. so you could update the charte.
114 Bill Lee // May 1, 2012 at 5:01 pm
For other size and number comparisions….
From press reports in October 2011 of the Burnaby Kinder Morgan rupture, sizes were:
“An excavator working on a sewage line pierced a pipeline in July 2007, releasing more than 250,000 litres of crude oil. About 70,000 litres flowed into Burrard Inlet, sparking a $15-million cleanup.
Crude oil also sprayed 11 houses on Inlet Drive and caused a large evacuation of the area, forcing 250 residents from their homes.”
“According to the Transportation Safety Board (TSB), the pipe, which was 610 mm in diameter, was struck and punctured by a contractor’s excavator bucket during excavation of a trench for a new storm sewer line along Inlet Drive in Burnaby.”
See the TSB report (web page , about 14 printed pages, no evident PDF format) at
http://www.tsb.gc.ca/eng/rapports-reports/pipeline/2007/p07h0040/p07h0040.asp ( for more spicy reading, “Ce rapport est également disponible en français.” )
Pipeline Investigation Report
Crude Oil Pipeline – Third-Party Damage
Trans Mountain Pipeline L.P.
610-Millimetre-Diameter Crude Oil Pipeline
Kilometre Post 3.10, Westridge Dock Transfer Line Burnaby, British Columbia
24 July 2007
Report Number P07H0040
115 Bill Lee // May 1, 2012 at 5:09 pm
Attempts to assuage liabilty fears were made by Bruce Turnbull in the 4 part, multi-article Black Press series reference far above [ // Apr 24, 2012 at 4:19 pm #10 ]
Not so, says Bruce Turnbull of Western Canada Marine Response Corporation (WCMRC), formerly known as Burrard Clean.
All such vessels which sail into Canadian waters must have an arrangement with a spill response organization which, on the west coast, is WCMRC. The tankers, which must be double-hulled, are brought into Vancouver harbour by local pilots who know about any hazards that need to be avoided.
If there is a spill, and the tanker’s owner walks away, the ship would be seized and WCMRC would tap in to the insurance that tanker companies are required to purchase in advance, Canada’s Ship-source Oil Pollution Fund, Turnbull said. If that insurance runs out, a similar international fund is used.
“The taxpayer is not on the hook.”
WCMRC, which is primarily funded by four major oil companies (Imperial Oil, Shell Canada, Chevron and Suncor) and pipeline operator Kinder Morgan, responds to an average 20 spills a year, he said. They range from small gasoline spills from power boats and incidents involving canola oil, to the 100,000-litre spill resulting from the 2007 rupture of Kinder Morgan’s pipeline in North Burnaby, the largest Canadian incident it has responded to on the west coast.
As for how much oil is typically recovered, Turnbull said it’s not 100 per cent, due to a number of variables including evaporation. “Recovery is only part of an overall strategy. Protection and mitigation of damage to resources is a priority.”
Generally, the response involves containing spills with booms and collecting the oil using skimmers. If the responsible party requests a wildlife rescue response, as Kinder Morgan did in 2007, WCMRC may manage it or hire a professional organization to work within the response command structure
See more in the Black Press empire series in many community (weekly) papers and the various postiions of animals and fish conservation and the mop swabbers at:
http://www.burnabynewsleader.com/news/147207745.html
and look at the bottom of the article for the whole series.
OIL & WATER SERIES INDEX
A Black Press series exploring the logistics, risks and politics of Kinder Morgan’s proposed oil pipeline expansion.
PART 1:
How safe are oil tankers travelling southern B.C. waters?
Notable accidents involving oil
Boaters concerned about more oil tanker traffic coming to Burrard Inlet
Airlines pursue Richmond pipeline to satisfy growth
PART 2:
What happens if there’s an oil spill in B.C.?
‘People of the Inlet’ oppose Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion
PART 3:
Is B.C. destined to be Alberta’s oil superport?
Burnaby company in the business of disaster response
116 Glissando Remmy // May 1, 2012 at 6:27 pm
Thought of The Day
“In the 1930s they called it “The Great Depression”, now they call it… “the Great Diversion”!”
Bill Lee #112 #113 #114, thanks for posting all those goodies.
I would have too looked away, if these “environmentalists” were not that pushy.
One thing we need to say about them though, is that most of them, got caught in the middle of it, through no fault of their own.
It was either by accident, by ignorance or by “Charlie Chaplin”…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqFU8O53tr4
We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.
117 Roger Kemble // May 2, 2012 at 1:23 am
Stupid Season @ #104
A simple thank you will be sufficient!
118 Agustin // May 2, 2012 at 8:58 am
It’s a simple cost-benefit analysis.
Benefits:
- Some jobs, some money. Not much of either.
Costs:
- Risk of oil spill. Long time between catastrophic events*, enormous impact.
- Not turning the tide (pun somewhat intended) on fossil fuel use. There is already more oil being produced and exported every day than should be. No need to produce and export more.
The costs are much higher than the risks.
QED
* The longer we have oil tankers around, the more the probability of a spill approaches 100%. The question is not if there will be an oil spill, but when.
119 mezzanine // May 2, 2012 at 9:26 am
^ IMO you are dismissing the benefits out of hand. How many jobs? at what skill level and pay rate? What about support industries?
WRT risks, you say there is no acceptible risk level, when there clearly is. Otherwise the kinder Morgan terminal would have been shut down a long time ago. One might even consider shuttering the pipeline, it was buit along the fraser river, obviously important to all of BC and especially to Metro Vancouver.
If places that share similar values to the environment to vancouver, like rotterdam, can ship oil safely to the benefit of the local economy, I don’t see why we can’t.
120 Chris Keam // May 2, 2012 at 9:27 am
“as someone who observes that it takes oil/gas to run the modern world and even build bicycles, I’d like to hear more than just “Not here, thanks.””
I don’t think much of this line of reasoning. It’s not up to average citizens or governments to do the R&D work that should be taken care of by the industry proposing the plan. Would we accept the corollary that because one likes to eat beef that it would be up to those in opposition to having a feed lot operation within city limits to find an alternate location?
If I submit a proposal to a corporate client or pitch to an editor for some kind of work, and they reject it, I don’t get to sit back and say ‘well then, tell me what to do.’ I revise the plan in accordance with their wishes and hoped-for outcomes or choose to forego the gig.
121 MB // May 2, 2012 at 9:33 am
Paul T. 111
Weren’t you that Second Officer who woke up, jumped ship, swam to shore and assumed another identity after drinking with the captain a couple of hours before the Exxon Valdez FACT</p< hit Bligh Reef which was FACT indelibly recorded on all the charts in what became FACT one of the most egregious cases of FACT human error in recent history?
Weren’t you the Exxon PR chief that referred to the massive public backlash as “a bunch of NIMBYs who want to shut down industry”?
If you’re capable of actually saying So this is not about the environment vs. the economy. If we wanted to save the environment, we’d just shut the port down. But no one wants to do that then the above conjecture isn’t that far off.
Paul, no one wants to shut the Port down. But on the other hand no one — least of all you — has spelled out how to balance the risks and benefits of ramping up the Port oil exports of crude with the largest ships the Port will ever see, and that will FACT require dredging Second Narrows and FACT have to slip through First Narrows at high slack tide with all other ship traffic forced to shut down throughout Burrard Inlet during the transit.
122 Paul T. // May 2, 2012 at 9:36 am
CK, you’re right, it’s not up to the average citizen to do the R&D work… So your opposition, when so much R&D says we are the safest port to ship out of, is misplaced. So if you’re against it, explain why. Frances is right, try to explain why you’re against it without saying “Not here, thanks.”
123 mezzanine // May 2, 2012 at 9:40 am
@MB @120, In the frances bula article linked by bill lee, the ships will be the same oil transports that are in use today (‘aframax’ according to the article).
124 MB // May 2, 2012 at 10:08 am
@ Mezz 118
… IMO you [Agustin 117] are dismissing the benefits out of hand. How many jobs? at what skill level and pay rate? What about support industries?
I suspect the job creation related to ramping up crude exports and supertanker traffic in Vancouver won’t be as significant as one would hope.
Short of building another refinery and exporting value-added pretoleum resources instead of the raw stuff (I still contend that’s better in eastern Canada), you’ve got maybe a few hundred permanent jobs at scaled up terminals, and a smattering of new piloting and Kinder Morgan office jobs.
There will be perhaps 2,000 temporary construction jobs over about two years building the second pipeline and a new tank farm (expand the one on Burnaby Mountain?).
Then, of course, there will be thousands of jobs cleaning up a major spill (we’re talking potentially several times larger than Exxon Valdez), and as has been well-documented, they never get it all. The remaining crude will continue to stick to everything along hundreds of kilometres of coastline.
KM could still choose to bypass Vancouver and ship the crude south. This will make people like Paul T. 111 apopleptic, but the Port will survive and thrive, hopefully with the addition of exports of value-added green Canadian products and technology.
125 MB // May 2, 2012 at 10:11 am
@ Mezzz 120
In the frances bula article linked by bill lee, the ships will be the same oil transports that are in use today
Then why do they have to blast / dredge Second Narrows if not for wider ships with deeper draughts when loaded?
126 Agustin // May 2, 2012 at 10:15 am
@ mezzanine
I don’t know how many (do you?), but I can’t see how there would be many in Vancouver, or even in Greater Vancouver. But unless we’re talking about hundreds of full time jobs in Vancouver, I don’t see how it would outweigh the costs.
Strawman argument fallacy. Try again.
If you’re going to bring in Rotterdam (or other examples) you’re going to need to explain further details. For example, what is the infrastructure being used? What safety measures are in place? What benefits have been experienced?
Furthermore you also have to bring up examples where things have not gone well. There is a sizable list to choose from, including a recent spill here in Greater Vancouver.
127 mezzanine // May 2, 2012 at 11:07 am
@agustin 125
IMO my point re: acceptible risk levels still stands. Even you seem to agree:
“The longer we have oil tankers around, the more the probability of a spill approaches 100%. The question is not if there will be an oil spill, but when
…..
But unless we’re talking about hundreds of full time jobs in Vancouver , I don’t see how it would outweigh the costs.”
WRT to rotterdam, here si alink that i got in 5 seconds from google:
http://www.portofrotterdam.com/en/Business/liquid-bulk/Pages/refining-pipelines.aspx
I don’t have the time to search out further stats on rotterdam, other than to say that both vancouver and rotterdam strive to be efficient ports, care about their local economy and local environment, yet rotterdam handles a lot of oil traffic without headline incident.
——
“Furthermore you also have to bring up examples where things have not gone well.”
that’s the thing – it’s easy to get a viceral response to a bad spill, but what is the actual data?
i don’t know off-hand events in the local area where things have not gone well. There was the spill resulting from sloppy excavating by (city of burnaby?) work crews, and the recent fire at cherry point refinery. But don’t take my word for it.
128 Sean Bickerton // May 2, 2012 at 11:09 am
From #114 Bill Lee:
“pipeline operator Kinder Morgan, responds to an average 20 spills a year, he said. They range from small gasoline spills from power boats and incidents involving canola oil, to the 100,000-litre spill resulting from the 2007 rupture of Kinder Morgan’s pipeline in North Burnaby, the largest Canadian incident it has responded to on the west coast.”
Enough said …
129 MB // May 2, 2012 at 11:13 am
@ Mezz re: Rotterdam vs. Vancouver.
You got me curious, so I took a coffee break and flew in via Google Earth.
Rotterdam lies about 30 km inland from the North Sea at the confluence of the Rotte and Nieuwe Mass Rivers. This part of the Netherlands has been totally re-engineered. A new canal called the New Waterway was carved all the way to the North Sea, and it is 1,300 m wide (shore to shore) at the mouth. It is divided in two longitudinaly with a breakwater.
The south shore is chock-a-block with huge oil terminals carved out of the soft alluvial soils, starting with the new Mausvlakte I and II right at the North Sea and extending about 25 km inland to Pernis. The breakwater appears to separate the supertanker traffic on the south shore from the rest of the marine traffic, and the ships have a minimuim of 500 m wide, clear shipping lanes with direct access to the sea.
Vancouver, on the other hand, has the 440m wide First Narrows (shore to shore — the shipping lanes which all Burrard inlet traffic must squeeze are a lot narrower) and is bounded by hard rock.
The Second Narrows is about 320m wide (shore to shore) with a very tight squeeze of around 160m between the railroad bridge abutments. Allowing for appropriate clearances, the shipping lane would be only about 70-80m wide under the bridge. All oil tanker traffic must pass through Second Narrows.
Unlike Rotterdam, there is no separation between supertankers and other marine traffic, therein requiring the shut down of all Port traffic when a supertanker is transiting through Burrard Inlet.
Moreover, Rotterdam supertanker traffic has direct access to the open sea, whereas the BC coast presents many more navigational obstacles and twisting shipping lanes beyond Vancouver (and Kitimat) for at least 100 km before it enters the open sea.
Impossible? No.
But Rotterdam and Vancouver are night and day when it comes to minimizing the risk of expanded oil exports and potentially catastrophic spills as seen from the huge differences in the physical characteristics between these ports, let alone years of experience managing that risk.
130 Roger Kemble // May 2, 2012 at 11:38 am
mezzanine @ #118
“ if places that share similar values to the environment to Vancouver, like Rotterdam, can ship oil safely to the benefit of the local economy, I don’t see why we can’t. ”
Actually Euro port, (Rotterdam) is an importer of oil. The Rhine estuary is very wide as it opens into the North Sea: it has been engineered for over a century to take massive traffic. Euro port is massive.
Across the North Sea the oil importing Immingham docks are nowhere near as big. The Humber is much wider and free of obstacles. It too has, in my memory, been there for nearly a century.
But the UK has an all ’round seacoast allowing for many oil ports. The Torrey Canyon made a name for itself in 1967 when it sank off the north coast of Cornwall dumping its load contaminating the coast even to this day, I am told.
Kinder Morgan has been there, unnoticed at Ioco, for as long as I remember. Obviously huge infrastructure changes and additions will be necessary if we are to realize our dream to be an oil economy: and I do not see how we cannot!
If we are stuck with shipping tar and bitumen, we’d be wise to invest in updates. If KM wants to make a buck shipping out of our port then it must pay: i.e. replace the Second Narrows railway bridge and dredge First and Second Narrows and develop a new super maneuverable tug.
As for insurance paper work! Who the hell will care to read the fine print when the inlet is clogged solid with tar bitumen and the pong is sending us all to the hospital!
I have sailed both narrows in my little sailboat and can understand what will happen to a large oil barge if the tide captures it.
131 Bill Lee // May 2, 2012 at 12:00 pm
And Vancouver Harbour has one of the most polluted bottoms in Canada. Hamilton is worse.
And they want to disturb it in any way by dredging (to where would the deposits be sent), and by blasting?
Meanwhile the Surrey Leader newspaper says in a headline: Metro’s inland cities not rushing to judge oil pipeline http://www.surreyleader.com/news/149714335.html Updated: May 01, 2012 12:52 PM
….”Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts, who chairs Metro Vancouver’s port cities committee, said it’s too early to pass judgment because Kinder Morgan is still far away from formally filing an application to the National Energy Board, a move expected after as much as two years of company-led public consultations.
“It’s really important to ensure we have all of the information,” she said.
“We want to know what emergency response measures are in place. We want to know what the environmental measures will be and any other impacts we need to have brought forward to us.”
and
“Abbotsford Mayor Bruce Banman said his city needs to work with Kinder Morgan to ensure there’s proper consultation on local concerns, and noted his city stands to receive an extra $1 million or more in property tax each year for the expanded pipeline corridor.”
Expanded corridor? [ See map on Surrey Leader page http://raven.b-it.ca/portals/uploads/surrey/.DIR288/Map-KMTransMountainpipelineROW-LowerMainland-7web.jpg
“Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain oil pipeline is shown in green. The proposed twin pipeline might not necessarily follow the exact same right-of-way.”
Hello? They want 100 metre right of way (300 Druid feet), about a city block wide path!!
The current path is aobut 10 metres, a house-lot wide, not a city block wide.
Will this mean compulsory expropriation, crossing under farms (they don’t tunnel, it is Cambie street all over again!!!)
Time for a different harbour coming out of Toba or Bute Inlets, if not Rivers inlet and other fjords along the coast.
I still say that the oil is going to go down the coast to the U.S. not to Asia. Kinder Morgan doesn’t have terminals in Asia.
132 Bill Lee // May 2, 2012 at 12:01 pm
And Vancouver Harbour has one of the most polluted bottoms in Canada. Hamilton is worse.
And they want to disturb it in any way by dredging (to where would the deposits be sent), and by blasting?
Meanwhile the Surrey Leader newspaper says in a headline: Metro’s inland cities not rushing to judge oil pipeline http://www.surreyleader.com/news/149714335.html Updated: May 01, 2012 12:52 PM
….”Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts, who chairs Metro Vancouver’s port cities committee, said it’s too early to pass judgment because Kinder Morgan is still far away from formally filing an application to the National Energy Board, a move expected after as much as two years of company-led public consultations.
“It’s really important to ensure we have all of the information,” she said.
“We want to know what emergency response measures are in place. We want to know what the environmental measures will be and any other impacts we need to have brought forward to us.”
and
“Abbotsford Mayor Bruce Banman said his city needs to work with Kinder Morgan to ensure there’s proper consultation on local concerns, and noted his city stands to receive an extra $1 million or more in property tax each year for the expanded pipeline corridor.”
Expanded corridor? [ See map on Surrey Leader page raven.b-it.ca/portals/uploads/surrey/.DIR288/Map-KMTransMountainpipelineROW-LowerMainland-7web.jpg]
“Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain oil pipeline is shown in green. The proposed twin pipeline might not necessarily follow the exact same right-of-way.”
Hello? They want 100 metre right of way (300 Druid feet), about a city block wide path!!
The current path is aobut 10 metres, a house-lot wide, not a city block wide.
Will this mean compulsory expropriation, crossing under farms (they don’t tunnel, it is Cambie street all over again!!!)
Time for a different harbour coming out of Toba or Bute Inlets, if not Rivers inlet and other fjords along the coast.
I still say that the oil is going to go down the coast to the U.S. not to Asia. Kinder Morgan doesn’t have terminals in Asia.
133 gman // May 2, 2012 at 12:43 pm
There are thousands of ships every year using the inlet and I’m wondering if someone could point to any major accidents.The way people are talking you would think the bottom must be littered with wrecks,you make it sound like its bumper cars out there. I would like to see some statistics on all these previous catastrophes that must have already taken place and if there isn’t any why would we assume that there will be in the future.
134 Agustin // May 2, 2012 at 12:46 pm
@ mezzanine,
No, what I said was that unless there were lots of full time jobs for Vancouver, it’s not worth the risk for the city – not that it’s never worth the risk.
Then I would respectfully say that you are unprepared to bring Rotterdam into the discussion at all. I’m all ears, but let’s not throw naked assertions around.
You could start here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_spill
Or at the link shown in comment #22 (in response to you, BTW), or #37.
I’d love to have a discussion about the actual data. Please cite some that shows that the risk is worth taking (I believe that is your position).
I’m not sure if you are doing this, but I think that as a society we have a tendency to dismiss damage that stems from sloppy work or other human error. Human error is ever-present. It has led to a lot of catastrophes and it will lead to a lot more, and it doesn’t make catastrophes any less catastrophic. It must be a consideration when weighing the risks.
—-
Let’s carry the discussion further. In #128, MB has talked about ways that Rotterdam has reduced the risk of a catastrophe on their shores. What the City of Vancouver is proposing here is to reduce the impact of a catastrophe by imposing minimum insurance requirements.
I predict (hope!) that the City will oppose the expansion altogether, but what is the problem with the steps taken so far? What’s wrong with wanting to minimize the financial impact of a spill? What’s wrong with wanting to internalize this externality into Kinder Morgan’s activities?
135 mezzanine // May 2, 2012 at 12:51 pm
There’s also hamburg. a much busier port than vancouver handling ++oil. It’s ~ 100 km upstream on the elbe river.
maximum draught regardless of tides = 12.8 meters; high tide = 15 metres. (1)
Compared to vancouver @ 2nd narrows
maximum draught regardless of tides = 11.9 meters; high tide = 12.5 metres. (2)
i’m no sailor, but these seem similar, and hamburg handles a lot more oil. I’d worry if vancouver had to handle more than 1 aframax tanker a day, but i don’t see why we can’t move up from 2-3 ships per week.
136 Roger Kemble // May 2, 2012 at 12:52 pm
Bill Lee @ #130
“Time for a different harbour coming out of Toba or Bute Inlets, if not Rivers inlet and other fjords along the coast.”
That wouldn’t go down well with Raif Mair who has been struggling against Enbridge’s Gateway for well over a year. As Rafe constantly repeats given Enbridge’s record “a spill isn’t a possibility it is a mathematical certainty.”
Barging thru accessible Vancouver Harbour is different to twin pipes ranging over the Rockies, over 1000 salmon bearing streams and wilderness. A pipe rupture could spill for weeks before anyone would know.
Then how to make repairs? By helicopter? I don’t thinq so . . .
137 mezzanine // May 2, 2012 at 12:52 pm
http://www.hafen-hamburg.de/en/content/elbe-river
http://www.portmetrovancouver.com/libraries/port_users_marine_operations/harbour_manual.sflb.ashx
page 32
138 mezzanine // May 2, 2012 at 1:07 pm
@agustin,
i’d agree it’s a cost/benefit analysis, but you and i disagree about the magnitude of the potential benefits and potential risks.
WRT rotterdam versus vancouver – see my info about hamburg. that being said, “making the port safer for shipping” opens up a whole other debate that i don’t want to get into further port infrastructure that will make shipping safer but be controversial, like a pipeline to deltaport, or the tank farm in south richmond for YVR.
Certainly you and I agree that we both want the same thing – a safe and secure environment and a thriving local economy.
Kinder morgan’s application IIRC will take 2 years to prcess and a lot can happen in 2 years.
139 Bill Lee // May 2, 2012 at 1:23 pm
@Roger Kemble // May 2, 2012 at 12:52 pm #135
Yes, I agree.
I was just suggesting that the Vancouver harbour, created by the Railways (Railroads) coming down the Fraser Canyon to the sea in the 19th century, the inner harbour really doesn’t fit the urban area anymore.
(Few remember when freight came ashore on Kitsilano beaches)
Maybe it is time for a new freight, bulk, container, break-bulk harbour closer to Asia by going north to other places.
And yes, a break is inevitable, along the land or the sea.
Transportation Safety Board annual report and by the months http://www.tsb.gc.ca/eng/stats/pipeline/prelim-2011/index.asp
“A total of 5 pipeline accidents”…”In 2011, 165 pipeline incidents were reported…”
[ See left column for more ]
And yes, Mr. Rafe Mair was also right on the run-of-the-river power debacle and those should be stopped too in their poor design. At least we can close the physical plant in many cases.
We don’t care about our water, either drinking water, the misuse of it as primary water, nor the oceans we shit into.
140 Bill Lee // May 2, 2012 at 1:27 pm
@mezzanine // May 2, 2012 at 9:40 am 122
If true that it will only be Aframax, they are still large ships having 120,000 Dead Weight (metric) Tonnes.
Part of a ship size article
- quote
….”Aframax Tankers: The name Aframax comes from the Average Freight Rate Assessment (AFRA) system. The aframax tankers were initiated because of the size constraints that were posed when large oil tankers entered sea-routes highly prone to traffic.
PHOTO-aframax1 300×237 Panamax and Aframax Tankers: Oil Tankers with a Difference
The aframax tankers weigh generally around or less than 120,000 DWT (Dead Weight Tonnes). This size again, is a very strict stipulation. The aframax tankers generally ply in the European waters of the Black Sea. In addition these tankers are also found as cargo containers in the sea-routes of the Caribbean Sea, North Sea and the one of the most important and busiest route of the Mediterranean Sea.
It has to be noted that from amongst the major oil exporting nations in the world, it is the countries who export oil on a comparatively lesser level than the Middle-Eastern countries that rely on the aframax tankers. This is because the level of oil exported from the Middle-Eastern is quite high and they make use of larger naval vessels to cargo oil. Also, because of the usage of such heavy vessels, the sea-routes tend to get blocked and tankers like the aframax tankers end up proving to be a great asset.
PHOTO-aframax2 300×189 Panamax and Aframax Tankers: Oil Tankers with a Difference
The panamax tankers and the aframax tankers are a feasible solution to the ever growing problem of traffic in sea-routes. By coming up with such easy-to-adopt solutions, it has been proved beyond doubt that through proper adaptations of engineering science and technology, every problem can be solved and resolved permanently.
You might also like to read What are gas carriers? and What are ULCC and VLCC Vessels?”
– end quote
Read more: marineinsight.com/marine/types-of-ships-marine/panamax-and-aframax-tankers-oil-tankers-with-a-difference
[ Wikipedia has notes, and stub articles on Aframax, Capesize, Chinamax, Handymax/Supramax, Handysize, Malaccamax, Panamax and New Panamax, Q-Max (Qatar-max), Seawaymax, Suezmax, VLCC and ULCC ship sizes. ]
141 MB // May 2, 2012 at 4:18 pm
@ Mezz 127
i don’t know off-hand events in the local area where things have not gone well. There was the spill resulting from sloppy excavating by (city of burnaby?) work crews…
The multiple lawsuits that erupted (pardon the pun) from this gusher (200,000+ litres) focused on the key fact that Kinder Morgan did not have accurate “as built” drawings indicating the exact location of the old pipe, not was there an adequate effort to locate the exact location with utility-locating sensors. They were about 2m off. This was published by various media.
I am unable to locate the lawsuit settlement terms on line (probably under wraps), but have heard a runour that Kinder Morgan and possibly Burnaby had to assume the majority of liability on the accident.
I also know that KM has really tightened up their control over their pipeline easements and now require a permit for any work within 30m.
142 MB // May 2, 2012 at 4:29 pm
After a 2007 pipeline leak of 210,000 litres of oil in Burnaby, caused when an excavation company punctured the line, Kinder Morgan paid $15-million for remediation and reimbursement to residents forced out of their homes.
From Frances Bula’s May 1st G&M article.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/british-columbia/robertson-seeks-to-protect-vancouver-from-increased-tanker-traffic/article2418663/
143 Agustin // May 2, 2012 at 5:26 pm
@ mezzanine – I appreciate your approach: this is policy to be weighed out carefully, and probably best done over a pint.
For now we’ll agree to disagree
I’d be interested to get your thoughts on the other cost I listed:
- Not turning the tide (pun somewhat intended) on fossil fuel use. There is already more oil being produced and exported every day than should be. No need to produce and export more.
As well, on the alternative of refining the product in situ (or thereabouts) and shipping finished products east to the rest of Canada instead of overseas. (This suggestion was also raised recently by the apparently-cranky former head of the Bank of Canada, David Dodge.)
IMHO we need to have a frank, open discussion in this country on energy policy. That means what we do with oil and gas but also electricity and energy efficiency. I think we’re missing out on huge potential to become a lot less damaging on the environment while at the same time becoming the continent’s (and, to a lesser extent, the world’s) power supplier. To me, the Kinder Morgan expansion is 20th-century thinking.
144 MB // May 3, 2012 at 11:46 am
Agustin 143
IMHO we need to have a frank, open discussion in this country on energy policy. That means what we do with oil and gas but also electricity and energy efficiency. I think we’re missing out on huge potential to become a lot less damaging on the environment while at the same time becoming the continent’s (and, to a lesser extent, the world’s) power supplier. To me, the Kinder Morgan expansion is 20th-century thinking.
Absolutely right.
145 Bill Lee // May 24, 2012 at 4:56 pm
and now…..
Kinder Morgan reduces size of Vancouver-Alberta Trans Mountain expansion
By Jeffrey Jones, Reuters May 23, 2012
Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Kinder+reduces+size+Vancouver+Alberta+Trans+Mountain+expansion/6667481/story.html
CALGARY – Kinder Morgan Energy Partners has reduced the size of a planned expansion of its pipeline to the Pacific Coast after fewer shippers than expected signed 20-year contracts that would allow surging Canadian oil supplies to be shipped to Asia, the company said on Wednesday.
Kinder Morgan now plans a $4.1 billion expansion of its Trans Mountain pipeline to the Vancouver area from Alberta, increasing capacity to 750,000 barrels a day from 300,000. That is down from last month’s estimate of 850,000.
It had expected enough contracts to support a $5 billion project with crude production from the Alberta oil sands forecast to more than double over the next decade. But a few potential shippers it thought would sign onto the lengthy obligations had failed to obtain their boards’ approvals by the deadline, prompting the reduction, Kinder Morgan said.
The Trans Mountain expansion is the second multibillion-dollar proposal aimed at opening up lucrative new markets in Asia for Canadian oil producers, now captive to U.S. customers amid a glut that has led to bargain-basement price discounts.
The first, Enbridge Inc’s $5.5 billion Northern Gateway pipeline to Kitimat, British Columbia, from Alberta, is the subject of public hearings that began in January.
Both projects face opposition from environmental groups and some native communities in British Columbia. Vancouver city council has also come out against the Kinder expansion, which would increase… [ more ]
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