The Pros and Cons

This is basically a wrap up of the information split into sections of what benefits us, and what disadvantages us when we continue with the production and processing of the tar sands for bitumen.

The Pros:
- It is a reliable source of crude oil because of the large deposits present

- Canada’s economy will do better because of the large deposits of tar sands oil, in comparison to other countries

- Canada’s economy growth is mainly because of the crude oil

- If we were to ever run out of oil wells, we could always depend on the tar sands for our oil needs

- If more tar sands sites are opened, they would create more jobs for unemployed workers

Cons:
- The cost of processing, refining and upgrading the bitumen from the tar sands is extremely expensive and harmful to the environment in almost every way

- Even though we have large amounts of the oil, majority of it gets sent to the United States, even when the prices of gasoline are continually rising in Canada

- If the price of crude oil were to ever drop a great deal, Canada’s economy as a whole will plummet.

- We are continuing to become even more dependent on crude oil, even if we were to run out of oil from oil wells, we would look to depend on the tar sand oil, rather than searching for new, better energy sources

- If too many workers get employed to work at tar sands sites, other job positions would be needed to be filled (there will be a lack of workers in other jobs) Like in Alberta, where there are not many skilled trade workers because majority of them had gotten jobs related to the tar sands projects

- Health effects on humans due to the increased exposure to greenhouse gas emissions like sulphur dioxide, nitrogen, etc. and the water contamination from the oil sands sites causing health problems like leukemia, and other rare cancers

- Environmental effects like the large amounts of greenhouse gas emissions that may prevent us from meeting our national greenhouse and death/ deformities that affect animals

- Other countries apart of the Kyoto agreement might get angry or irritated that we haven’t kept our promise to lower our greenhouse gas emissions if we continue at our growth rate. This will cause other governments and countries

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Obviously, there were more disadvantages than advantages. What should be noticed from this is that the advantages all had to do with the economy. So, the tar sands projects are good for us economically as a country, but it's damaging to us in every other aspect. Especially regarding the environment and health issues that may concern us. If I were to consider all aspects of the tar sands, I would say that it's definitely something that should be taken care of, or taken out. There are way too many bad things that occur from the tar sands because of the way it's being taken care of and handled, even if it helps our economy, I don't think that it's worth the harm its inflicting on us and the environment.

Forecast For the Future

As you can see in the graph above, you can see the large amounts of money that was invested in tar sands productions. The amount invested in tar sands have increased tremendously over the past few years, at the same time money spent on conventional oil and gas projects have been decreasing. This shows us that Canada has shifted their focus from the conventional oil sources to the tar sands oil. Even though in 2008 economists stated that Canada will be in one of its worst recessions, the government still invested so much money into the tar sands projects even though it provides less oil that the conventional oil (if you were to mine oil from both sources with the same amount of funding) This is showing us that the government of Canada really values the tar sands oil and that it is becoming our main source of oil. However, there are cons to this new shift of interest, as mentioned earlier the cost of processing the tar sands to produce oil is much more costly and it does not produce as much oil as other conventional sources.




As you can see in the graph above, the amount of bitumen in each barrel of crude oil has become almost half of the entire barrel. From the amount of money spent on the tar sand operations shown in the previous graph, only half of the money spent gets usable synthetic crude. The one thing both of these graphs show would be the increase in tar sands activity. Compared to the earlier years, the activity of tar sands projects have increased by almost 700% since 1985 and the amount of oil barrels we get have increased as well. The amounts of money spent on the tar sands operations have also increased by about 8 times the amount spent in 1999. The tar sand deposits in Alberta have become of utter importance to Canada’s economy.

Based on this info, I predict that the activity of tar sands projects will continue to increase for the next few decades, until the oil is irretrievable or until there is a new form of oil that can be used or taken. With the increase in activity, this form of oil will become major components of our economy which could be a good or bad thing, depending on how successful these projects are. If the prices of oil continue to rise, our economy will have great benefits but if the prices of oil were to drop, our economy would also plummet with it. I feel like we will become dependent on the tar sands for our oil consumption needs, which obviously isn’t good because once we’re dependent on this, we won’t try to find other sources of energy that are actually good for the environment. Also, many economists have been saying that tar sands productions are waste of money because of the bitumen content in the oil. Nowadays, the bitumen is being refined and upgraded even further into synthetic crude oil, proving that tar sands won't be as much of a waste of money as the economists thought.

Social, Economic, and Environmental Effects

Environmental Effects:

When extracting tar sands from the deposits, a common form of extraction is called In Situ. This process uses high pressure steam to heat up the deposit for a month or two. After the months, the steaming is stopped, and after a little bit of time, bitumen leaks into the dug wells where it will be pumped out and transported to processing plants. With this process, a lot of water is used and wasted because once the water is used, it cannot be reused due to the toxins/ chemicals it came in contact with and is now carrying. The reason this has a negative effect on the environment is because the toxic water is not disposed of properly, as there is no proper way of disposing it. The contaminated water is placed into tailing ponds which are manmade, and its purpose is to hold all of the contaminated waters that come from the tar sands productions. Because the ponds are extremely large, many birds often try to land on them and when they come in contact with the tailing ponds, their health and lives are at risk due to the exposure of the chemicals.



These tailing ponds are so toxic that now, certain companies use propane canons to prevent ducks from landing in them. Not only birds are affected by these tailing ponds, fish have also been suffering from the chemical exposure, as some of the tailings run into rivers and lakes. For example, in a reserve downstream from the Athabasca tar sands site, fish have been growing bumps and are developing other mutations/ deformities over the past few years, at around this time, tar sands production activity have also increased.

Along with the water pollution that is occurring due to the tar sands projects, a lot of greenhouse gases are being emitted in the production of crude oil from the sands. The amount of greenhouse gases this process emits is what makes tar sands the most harmful source of oil in the world. The production and processing of the sand was responsible for 3-5 % of Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions in 2008, and the percentage has only been increasing the past two years. Emissions from the processing plants and sand sites have increased so much that it has become the largest contributor to our nation’s greenhouse gas emissions, and might even be able to prevent Canada’s duty to reduce the emissions, and can even go over the limits of previous years, as the emissions have only been increasing with the rising activity of tar sand operations. It’s not only greenhouse gasses that have been released into the atmosphere, other substances like nitrogen oxide, sulphur oxide, particulate matter and other hazardous organic compounds. All of these chemicals are really dangerous for our health and can cause many health problems, but that will be further explained in the health/social concerns section of this assignment.



Social/Health Effects:

Most people who are aware of the environmental consequences do not realize that it’s only the wildlife that is affected. With all of the chemicals like sulphur oxide and nitrogen oxide, greenhouse gasses, particulate matter, and hazardous organic compounds being released into our atmosphere it’s obvious that they are damaging to our health. Breathing in sulphur and nitrogen oxides can lead problems regarding the respiratory system. Also, particulate matter has been linked to many different kinds of health problems like asthma, emphysema and a number of heart diseases. While exposure to those substances is hazardous, the worst and most dangerous would be exposure to the volatile organic compounds. Exposure to these compounds can cause even more serious problems like brain damage and even certain types of cancer. Other parts that would affect our health would include the water contamination that occurs during sand processing to obtain the oil. The water that is put into tailing ponds eventually leak into streams, river basins and lakes. The contaminated water contains toxic chemicals that can cause deformities and even death if animals were to come in contact with it. This affects us by contaminating our drinking water/water resources and spreading disease and causing deformities and mutations of animals that we may eat. The toxins end up being consumed by the fish in the rivers/lakes and when we eat the fish, we would end up consuming the toxins as well. In communities and reserves downstream the Athabasca Tar sands deposit have been suffering from higher cancer rates, the more common forms would be leukemia, lymphoma, lupus and more rare cancers. These communities have higher cancer rates than other areas of Canada, so doctors and scientists have been linking these statistics to the tar sands operations and toxic tailing ponds that have been contaminating water. Another piece of evidence to prove that the toxins are the cause of these increased cancer rates would be the visible deformities of fish downstream from the sites. The fish have been growing lumps, developing humpbacks, and have crooked tails, again these deformities increased as the tar sands development and projects became more active.

Politically, Canada will become a more powerful country with the help of the tar sands because of the world’s constant demand/need for oil. Other crude oil reserves have been decreasing, and Alberta has the largest tar sand deposit in the world, this will also provide huge financial benefits to Canada as a country.



Economic Effects:
Tar Sands Oil (refined bitumen) is very valuable because it provides us with crude oil, which at the moment is hard to find. Sources of crude oil are decreasing, but the demand for the oil continues to increase every year, this will provide Canada and Alberta with plenty of financial benefits in the future, Since Alberta holds the largest reserve of tar sands. Our economy will become stronger as the need for crude oil increases, according to scientists, Canada will eventually become the main source of synthetic crude oil. But of course a lot of money must be put out in order for us to continually process the bitumen and refine it into usable oil. The good thing about tar sands oil at the moment is that there is a lot of it here; the only bad thing is that the cost of refining and upgrading the natural bitumen is extremely costly, and ironically, uses up a lot of natural gas (approximately 600 million cubic feet) each day. Particularly in Alberta, many skilled trades’ people end up working in a tar sands site, so around that area it is really hard to find a skilled trade’s person. Lastly, everyone has noticed that the price of gas just continues to rise, if we have so much oil in the tar sands, why is this happening? The reason for this is because majority of our oil ends up being exported to the United States as the synthetic crude is their main source of energy.

Why is it Used? Whats the Problem?

Why is it used?

Bitumen is used because of its unique qualities. It contains components that allow it to harden and become resistant to weather conditions, as well as seal and strengthen products because of its tough nature. Also, it is used because it contains hydrocarbons that can be made into synthetic crude oil, so we’d have another source of energy if we were to run out of our other synthetic crude sources.

The problem?

There has been a lot of controversy over the tar sands for the past few years, but what one would realize would be that it’s not the tar sands that are the problem; it’s the extracting and processing methods that the environmental societies are angry about. The extracting methods are a concern because when the tar deposit sites use the In Situ extraction process, which is the process of using steam to heat up the tar sand formation and then waiting for the bitumen to leak into the created wells where it will be pumped out and transported to refineries. It’s become a problem because of the water that is used in the process; once the water had come in contact with the tar sands it is unusable afterwards because becomes toxic due to the chemical exposure. But this will be explained in better detail in the environmental effects section of the glog.

The processing methods of bitumen, which upgrades it to synthetic crude oil (used in gasoline, fuel, etc.) is a concern that people should take notice to because of the large amounts of different greenhouse gases and other harmful substances it emits, as well as the amount of energy that is used per day just for tar sands productions. Again, these will be discussed in the environmental and health effects sections later on.

What is Bitumen Used For?

Bitumen is used for a wide variety of purposes, but it’s mainly used for making asphalt and paving roads. Its sturdy traits enable it to make the roads last for long periods of time under many different weather conditions. Bitumen, whether it is mixed with asphalt or used alone, actually covers around 98 percent of all the roads in America. Bitumen is also used for waterproofing materials like dishwashers and swimming pools and is sometimes used to soundproof rooms. It is also used in particular rubbers and paints and it can be a strong sealant when fixing and making roofs, and it is used in making shingles for houses. Over the past few years, there has been a new use for bitumen that has been discovered, and it is now becoming increasingly popular with gasoline manufacturers. Bitumen has become a main component in the production of synthetic crude oil that runs through our vehicles, heats our homes and acts as our overall energy supplier. Recently, bitumen extracted from tar sands are becoming more important to gasoline and energy suppliers because it is a stable source of energy compared to other synthetic crude sources.