As the United States expands its oil-refining capabilities, more than two-thirds of planned capacity will be devoted to processing crude oil from Canada’s tar sands, says a new report from the Environmental Integrity Project and Environmental Defense Canada. Tar-sands capacity is predicted to see a total increase of 1.9 million barrels per day, says the report, while conventional-oil refining drops off. Production of tar-sands oil is cheaper and much dirtier than regular ol’ crude: Greens lament the air-polluting nasties spewed by tar-sands operations, as well as encroachment on Canada’s boreal forest. Emphasizing the tar sands as a fuel source is insanity, says EDC’s Matt Price: “Nowhere else are we talking about ripping up an area the size of Florida, creating massive toxic lakes you can see from space with the naked eye, and giving off three times the greenhouse-gas emissions to produce oil when compared with conventional crude.” Well, when you put it that way …
