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Blog entries by mentatoom

Fracking Review Misses the Mark
posted by mentatoom
Many Nova Scotians don't want a review of fracking, they want a ban.

After a significant public outcry against the practice, the Government of Nova Scotia has launched a review of the rules and regulations of hydraulic fracturing.  

Hydraulic fracturing is a controversial technique for extracting methane from shale deposits.  Oil and gas companies drill wells and pump in a mixture of fresh water, sand and toxic chemicals to crack apart shale and release the captured methane.  Some of the fracking fluid returns to the surface but much of it is lost underground.  Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, has been associated with the contamination of groundwater and water wells as well as other health and environmental impacts. 

The review will be led by staff from the departments of energy and environment.  The review addresses concerns around water exclusively.  The public has been invited to provide comments on the review process and the window for comments closed June 6.

However the limited focus on water leaves out a number of other impacts of fracking:

Air Quality

Storing shale gas at drill sites involves the release of volatile organic compounds which reduce air quality locally.  In some cases, rural areas have worse air quality than smoggy cities.  Worse still, the haze caused by fracking has been associated with creeping brain damage and other impacts as documented by Dr. Theo Colborn.

Climate Change

The province and industry trumpet shale gas as a clean alternative to coal.  It produces less greenhouse gas emissions per unit of energy than coal.  But a robust review would assess whether these claims are accurate.  A full lifecycle analysis of fracking as undertaken by Robert Horwath of Cornell University would provide a clearer picture.  

Tourism

Nova Scotia has invested heavily in the tourism sector.  Rural areas especially rely on visitors from out of province as a source of economic development.  As drill rigs and condensate tanks spring up...

$16 Billion Fighter Jets and Climate Change
posted by mentatoom

How quickly Canada’s controversial purchase of 65 F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter disappeared from the public consciousness.  After all this is a $16 billion purchase for a state with a massive $50 billion annual deficit and involved a tender without competing bids.  Surely it deserved more public discussion and contemplation?

Perhaps it disappeared from the public consciousness for the same reasons that cutbacks to social spending similarly vanish.  Despite our self righteousness, we all know, deep down in our civilized subconscious, that the price is worth every penny.

The second I heard of the announcement of the purchase, I knew what these fighter planes were for.  These fighter planes are not meant for Afghanistan where they would be of little value against homemade bombs.  Forget Iran and North Korea, the distracting bogeymen of the West.  When these fighters arrive some years hence, they are to be stationed in Canada, along the country's vast coastlines.  Sovereignty is just another word for homeland security.

And who will be their intended targets?  

Boats, perhaps even an airplane or two, of migrants, families seeking refuge in one of the few places to be spared the immediate effects of climate change.  A safe haven that has not dried out yet, where reliable crops still grow for now, where the future is bright until it isn’t.  Whether people from the parched Mediterranean or low-lying island states in the Pacific, they are coming.  It’s just a matter of time and desperation.

Hence the true purpose of these F-35s.  The sea will swallow up the evidence of our inhumanity.  But we’ll all know deep down in our hearts what we’ve really purchased in these fighter planes.  Self-delusion, after all, is a central feature of civilization.

Security and Impossible Futures
posted by mentatoom

The Government of Canada is spending $1 billion on security for the G8/G20 Summits in Toronto and Huntsville (including a $2 million fake lake). A hefty price tag to be sure. Not sure what they're expecting. Will Osama bin Laden finally make an appearance? Maybe the Raging Grannies are swelling their ranks with baby boomers? Perhaps registered and orderly marches shepherded by police are too scary for Steve and friends?

So what and who are we actually defending our dear leaders against?

Some years ago I read an interesting book by Jared Diamond called Collapse. The book outlines how ancient societies fall, including the Greenland Norse, the Mayans and the Easter Islanders. Various factors play a role in these collapses but one common theme is the isolation of elites from the signs of a weakening and precarious system. For better or worse these privileged individuals have the power to soften a fall or prevent an all out collapse altogether. In some cases they do listen (or are made to listen) and act.

So, for instance, a Mayan ruler will be blissfully unaware that food production is dropping due to environmental factors or due to bad policy because his dinner table is just as full as ever. The dancers still perform. The harem is just as pleasurable. The armies protecting him guard his palaces from tall ramparts. These armies keep the revolting, starving masses at bay or at least out of earshot of the dear leader and his inner circle.

And when the ultimate collapse comes, the ruler wonders how it could have happened. He never saw it coming and he never could have.

So maybe the $1 billion price tag is all about maintaining the roaring silence in the corridors of power. Stay the course. There’s no such thing as peak oil. Climate change is just a socialist plot. Tax the banks and our financial problems are solved.

And happily oblivious our dear leaders march us triumphantly into their impossible future.

Comments posted by mentatoom

Testing ground? in response to Good Work its Own Reward?

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