Tar Sands: Science and Propaganda

If the Obama government gives its approval to the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, greenhouse gas emissions could increase by four times more than what was predicted by the American secretary of state, maintain researchers from the Stockholm Environment Institute. Who is telling the truth?

The TransCanada Corporation is still waiting for the Obama government’s authorization to complete the construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline, which would transport oil from tar sands to oil refineries in the south of the United States. Because of the midterm election that will take place this fall, the probability is high that the decision won’t be announced for a few months, to the great detriment of the Harper government.

In the meantime, the war of words continues, with many studies and counter-studies for support.

It’s difficult to judge by reading the most recent conclusions published by two American researchers on the website of the international journal Nature Climate Change. The results were obtained by plugging the known data into a simple economic model of the balance of supply and demand.

It’s a question, therefore, of a theoretical estimation, like almost all studies of this sort, including the one used by the American secretary of state that allowed its authors to come up with the opposite results because of the choice of model used and the quality of the data used to feed the mathematical beast.

In the case that concerns us, American researchers from the Stockholm Environment Institute arrive at the prediction that the increase in the amount of oil transported by the pipeline toward the United States will markedly increase the global supply of this product. As a result, the price will go down, demand will rise, and so will greenhouse gas emissions.

To this, the Canadian government answers: that’s wrong! The increase in the shipment capacity of crude will have no effect on the quantity of oil used or on greenhouse gas emissions, since the Canadian product will only replace the oil imported from Europe, Africa or elsewhere.

Who is telling the truth? Only time will tell.

According to defenders of the pipeline project, the 800,000 barrels of crude that would be transported each day toward the American refineries would be equal to only one percent of global demand. That might seem negligible, but that’s forgetting that they are added to the hundreds of thousands of barrels pulled from shale and that exist in other pipeline projects in preparation in Canada, including the Northern Gateway (525,000 barrels a day destined for Asia) and Energie Est (1.1 million barrels a day that would pass through Quebec).

In total, the Canadian tar sands industry foresees doubling its production between now and 2030, and the majority of this oil is destined for exportation. Can we reasonably conclude that it’s not only going to replace existing supplies, but also add to them? Can we also acknowledge that the primary concern of the current conservative Canadian government isn’t the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, but the growth of the capacity for crude exportation in the West?

The studies keep coming and keep contradicting each other, which is only fair. What is less so is the determination of the Harper government to only see one side of the coin … in this subject as in others, unfortunately.