Nobody would be surprised if you uttered a “Holy Hell!!” At least not today. BP Oil’s announcement is an important signal to the rest of the fossil industry that things cannot move forward without some pain and change. BP will reduce its oil and gas production and increase low-carbon spending to $5 billion per year by 2030. The $5-billion annual renewables commitment is up from $500 million in 2019, which was only a pittance to appease governments and show that they were trying really hard to change their ways. No one bought it, but the governments didn’t care.

It would seem that this could be considered the “holy” part of the utterance. It’s expected a lot of people will just smile to themselves. Everyone knows that fossil fuel companies have been losing a lot of money since the oil war started between Russia and Saudi Arabia. Coupled with the decreasing demand from a pandemic, with no guarantee that a second wave isn’t coming, finances, investors, output credit and allowances must be carefully considered to keep afloat. Many haven’t been so lucky.

It might be difficult to believe that a fossil fuel company cares about global warming. They were aware of what their products would do to the environment long before it was ever made mainstream. Conspiring with government officials, who recognized the increasing value of tax revenue, very little was ever discussed, let alone admitted.

While some of these companies are changing their stripes and singing a different tune, governments are realizing that they too, have to come to terms with decreasing revenue. Many of them could easily be compared to a spoiled child that wants their mother’s constant attention. If it takes throwing a fit, they’re ready to get down on the floor and pound their fists and feet.

This brings us to the “Hell” part of the utterance. What do the Alberta government and federal government think they are doing by even considering firing up the coal mines? What do they think they’re doing throwing money at rich foreign companies that just laugh and accept it? And how the hell can they justify a 25% decrease in monitoring the oil sands, when it is one of the most dangerous, toxic, environmental disasters that has been allowed to continue in Canada unchecked.

The Environmental Minister Johnathon Wilkinson is being raked over the coals (pun intended) . So far, he hasn’t produced any credible excuse. Have the Liberals given free rein to Alberta to jump-start the economy at all costs? It isn’t any secret that we don’t have any plans to live up to the Paris Agreement set in 2016. The climate action tracker says:

Outside Peace River

“Canada continues with the incremental implementation of its Pan-Canadian Framework on Clean Growth and Climate, its overarching strategy for reducing emissions, adopted in 2016; often in the face of provincial pushback. The Government is implementing its coal-fired power plant phase-out, but it clearly needs to take more climate action, as emissions are projected to still be above 1990 levels beyond 2030, far from its Paris Agreement target and nowhere near a 1.5˚C-compatible pathway.”

According to the CBC news, they claim “The deal says no fieldwork is to be done on the main branch of the Athabasca River. That means the program won’t fund monitoring downstream of the oilsands even as the province considers proposals to allow the water from oilsands tailings ponds to be released into the river.”

Some of those chemicals are carcinogenic, and some damage the liver, kidneys and central nervous system. There are also cases of individuals suffering acute and chronic health effects while living near fracking operations – including nausea, rashes, dizziness, headaches and nose bleeds. Frankly, the people living near the wastewater holding ponds, are in serious danger. It has never been proven that any filtering system or reverse osmosis will remove all of the danger. Here’s what can happen if the release is not monitored:

Typical breakdown of equipment can cause effects like this:

• Scale formation on membranes, usually in the back-end stages – high salt passage, pressure difference in final stage.
• Bio-fouled pipe-work, cartridge filters and membranes – high pressure difference.
• Iron loading on cartridge filters. Iron fouling of membranes – high oressure difference, low permeate flow.
• Humic substances and organic fouling on membrane – low permeate flow, high feed pressure
• Colloidal particles foul micron filters and membranes – high Pressure difference, low permeate flow.
• Carbon fines foul micro filters and membranes.
• Cationic coagulant fouls membrane – low permeate flow, high feed pressure.
• Membrane damage – high salt passage and increased flux.
• High salt passage.
• High bacterial / fungal counts in water samples. Biofouling of membranes – high pressure difference.
• Colloidal and bacterial fouling of micron filters and membranes.
• Scale formation – CaCO3 only.
• High microbiological loading, biofilm, severe cartridge filter fouling.
• Fouling / scaling of membranes.

Mr. Wilkinson tried to deny the funding was being cut on Twitter yesterday. He said, “There is no Canada-Alberta Agreement to reduce oil sands monitoring. The decrease in this year’s spending reflects the loss of the spring/summer field season due to COVID-19. This was decided upon by the consensus of a 12 person body, including 6 Indigenous and 1 federal rep.” Unfortunately this would appear to be something the Liberals can’t weasel out of. More responses were supplied by Energy Mix. They referred to it as a “Twitter Storm.”

According to the Narwhal, “One single tailings pond, located at a Syncrude operation, is contained by the largest dam in the world, holding 540,000,000 cubic meters of material.

Driving Into Athabaska

Tailings ponds in the oilsands are unlined and there have been documented cases of contamination leaking from these pits into the Athabasca River. NAFTA even conducted an investigation into the threat tailings ponds pose to the environment.”

In another article NAFTA did an investigation into tailing ponds leaking. They said, “It’s been suspected for ages that these ponds have been seeping chemicals into nearby water systems — chemicals such as benzene, ammonia, cyanide and arsenic.”

Can you imagine how much worse this will get if it isn’t being monitored?