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B.C. government right to be Kinder Morgan cautious

A letter to the editor by Don Bright
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To the editor:

Would it not be nice if the petroleum industry, the federal government and the Alberta provincial government take a holistic approach to development, instead of only an economic approach?

The Prime Minister’s latest statement is that if the Kinder Morgan pipeline is not completed the result would be the federal government’s greenhouse gas reduction targets cannot be met. His argument, however, is based on the Alberta government’s refusal to sign on to the federal carbon tax plan unless Kinder Morgan is completed. There is no consideration of the results of the combustion of additional fossil fuels extrapolated from tar sands.

Please consider. Our only hope of reducing the production of greenhouse gases is to gradually phase out our use of fossil fuels, not encourage greater use. How does Kinder Morgan fit into that equation?

Also, please consider that several years ago it was determined that the emissions from tanker traffic in our lower mainland surpassed the greenhouse gas emissions from the city of Vancouver. How will the addition of an annual sailing of 200 huge oil tankers improve the situation?

Also, consider that the petroleum industry or governments have not submitted a plan to deal with dilbit spills. The several significant oil spills on the west coast of Canada were not caused by faulty technology, but by human error.

Want to place any bets that the 200 sailings of huge, football field-length tankers in usually very rough seas and often dense fog will not be subject to such errors?

How about the ballast emission from tankers that take on Asian coastal waters and empty the water onto our coast? It might be recalled that such caused considerable concern after the Japanese tsunami.

The B.C. government is correct in taking a cautious approach to Kinder Morgan.

Don Bright

Cowichan Bay