The Canadian province of Alberta has immense reserves of unconventional oil called tar sands or oil sands. A combination of technological advances and the rising cost of conventional oil has suddenly made the Alberta oil sands a very valuable commodity. Multinational corporations and state owned companies from China are competing over the rights to develop this resource. Meanwhile, the issue of how to get the oil from its remote location to refineries or shipping ports has become divisive. Environmentalists correctly point out that oil sands require particularly carbon-intensive production techniques. There are efforts under way to mitigate this, but they are not fully on line yet. Additionally, a key component of the environmental movement is dedicated to the fairly rapid elimination of the oil economy, and the commercialization and widespread use of unconventional oil would wreck those plans – there is more unconventional oil than conventional oil, and incorporating unconventionals into the economy on a large scale basis would usher in a Second Age of Oil that would probably last well into the next century. Although carbon mitigation programs would probably appear and grow alongside this exploitation of unconventional resources, the most ardent anti-oil environmentalists are not willing to take a chance on a mere probability. This is their moment to end the use of oil, and they will not give up that goal. To that end, they have organized a series of protests and political activities with the goal of killing the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which planners envision running through the Canadian and American plains states to terminals in Port Arthur, LA and Houston, TX.
Online, I have come across many supporters of Keystone who believe that these environmentalists are irrational obstructionists, and that they should simply be steamrolled and the pipeline forced upon them despite their objections. The “steamroll” strategy is becoming increasingly appealing to parties across the political spectrum, and it is as sophomoric as it is ineffectual. Politics is an art, and there are a few basic ways to get what you want, and to get it in such a way that the other side doesn’t seek to undo it once they regain power. One is old fashioned horse trading – wherein you give the other side something that they value in return for something that you value. Another is to co-opt members of the other side to your own position, to convince enough of them to “switch sides” that the core opposition is small enough that it is made politically ineffective. It is this latter approach which is the best option for Keystone supporters. Because, the fact of the matter is that the national government of Canada and the provincial government of Alberta are both committed to fully developing this resource and sending their oil to market. The question is in which direction will it head – south to the US, or west, to the Pacific coast and from there, largely, to China?
In the August 2011 issue, National Geographic magazine spotlighted what it called “the wildest place in North America,” British Columbia’s Great Bear Rainforest. The feature story exalts the stunning beauty and the environmental diversity of this ecological treasure. But, there is another article in the issue. That article highlights a threat to this region . . . the alternative to Keystone, “the pipeline through paradise,” across the Rockies to the Pacific. The dangers of this pipeline are greater than from the Keystone pipeline because it is more remote, more difficult to get to should something go wrong, and perhaps most important, because it would terminate at a waterway that is difficult for large vessels to navigate. Indeed, the various channels through which oil laden tankers would have to traverse are currently designated a “tanker free zone.”
Keystone supporters should seize for themselves the mantle of environmental protectors. Although the regions through which Keystone would be built are also ecologically rich and beautiful, they are also more developed than the Great Bear Rain Forest. The latter is an unspoiled treasure in greater need of protection. The oil is going to flow, the argument should state, and it is far better that it flow south, where we can respond more quickly and adeptly should a problem arise, than that we should risk disaster in one of the very few wild and remote places left on our continent. One of these pipelines is going to be built; the opponents of Keystone are willingly putting the irreplaceable treasure of Great Bear Rain Forest at risk.
Make the environmentalists choose. You won’t win them all over, but you will certainly sap their strength.
