Fossil Fuels Promotion = Horse Manure

By Peter Jones

So, Canada’s federal government has finally approved construction of the proposed Enbridge pipeline that is intended to carry bitumen from Alberta’s tar sands to Kitimat, and thence by ocean to China.

If we do not go ahead, the Prime Minister warns us, Canada’s economy will be in grave danger. “No country is going to take actions that are going to deliberately destroy jobs and growth in their country,” he declared a week ago, in a joint statement with the openly climate denying Prime Minister of Australia, Tony Abbott.  Read more at “Prime Minister Harper ups the ante!”

But what if none of this is true? What if there were two possible directions that Canada’s future economy could take, not just one? What if there was another future built on clean technology, renewable energy, sustainable transportation and zero-carbon buildings, in which Canada could prosper without the tar sands and the unwanted pipelines, and without all the fracking, the oil-polluted waters, the exploding trains, the waves of public opposition and the legal challenges from First Nations?

To Stephen Harper and his supporters, such a future is unthinkable. He would far rather we dwelled on the danger of not supporting fossil fuel expansion than the far graver danger of a world that is four, five or even six degrees warmer due to the carbon released by the fossil fuels. Read more at  “A Half Truth or a Suppressed Truth”.

1894: Danger – Horse Manure Ahead!

A hundred and twenty years ago, our economy was so dependent on horses that unless something was done, we were warned, we would drown under a sea of horse-manure. But what happened? Change happened—we invented our way into a different world.

And change is happening again. The Age of Fossil Fuels, which started with coal-fired steam engines, is winding down. Around the world, financially viable oil is running out; investors are beginning to walk away. By 2030 it may all be over, and the Solar Age will have stepped in to take over.

Once upon a time, iron replaced stone. Then cars replaced horses, and fossil fuels replaced whale oil. Today, renewable energy is replacing fossil fuels. The transition is upon us: you just need to know where to look.