Tar Sands in Alberta

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The tar sands of Alberta are one of the fastest growing industries in Canada.  Each year, Canada’s investment and production of oil is increasing meaning that more emissions are being released into the atmosphere. Even though the tar sands may be good for the economy, there are still many environmental factors to take into account as well.  This paper will outline the advantages and disadvantages of Alberta’s tar sands in terms of how the economy and the environment is being affected, as well as the government’s position in these issues.

The tar sands play a major role in the growth of Canada’s economy.  The reason for this is because Canada exports more oil than it imports. Oil exports to the United States have gone up by 547 percent.  Because oil demands are also going up in countries like India and China, Canada is investing and producing even more oil each year.  Today in Alberta, one billion barrels of petroleum are being produced a day.  In the next ten years, almost three billion barrels will be produced, 100, 000 new jobs will be created, as well as billions of dollars in taxes paid to the government.  According to a University of Calgary historian, “The oil sands give Canada one of the single greatest advantages of any state in the Western world; it gives Canada the ability to supply all of North America for the next 50 years without touching a drop of imported oil."1  In other words, this historian is saying that any other country would want the tar sands to help support their nation and grow their economy.  

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The tar sands of Alberta take up a huge amount of land making them the second-largest oil deposit in the world.  Tar sands are extra heavy oil deposited from a type of petroleum called bitumen.  Bitumen can be found in Alberta, 141, 000 square kilometres below the Northern forests. Within the last few years, the tar sands have grown even bigger taking up almost 2,000 square kilometres1 of land.   As the tar sands grow in size, they use up larger amounts of water and energy, and produce tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions.  Soon emissions will reach 2.3 million tonnes ...

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