As more Americans are waking up to the environmental implications of oil exploration in environmentally sensitive areas, a coalition of environmental groups has commissioned a top-notch advertising campaign against the Alberta tarsands entitled “Rethink Alberta“.
One of the main points it makes is that Alberta oilsands oil production emits three times the greenhouse gasses that it takes to produce a conventional barrel of oil.
Reactions in the blogosphere to the campaign, which is only a few days old, has been swift and typically derogatory. The oil industry has been paying writers and bloggers for years to pounce on posts and articles that in any way may mention the environmental failings of the oil industry – with the latest effort by BP being laughable at best, and thoughtless at worst.
Even mass media organizations have been piling on the campaign, with this piece from the Edmonton Journal being a good example. It contains hard facts about the environmental realities in Alberta as a true journalistic piece should, but does a lot of editorializing about the campaign that is likely motivated by the paper’s proximity to the offending parties.
Is it really stretching credibility to compare the Alberta oilsands to the BP disaster? I don’t think so. When I was in grade school and we were taught about the tar sands, we were taught at the same time that it was both economically not feasible to mine the tar sands and environmentally irresponsible. While the realities of the world have changed to make it economically feasible, there is no denying that it is environmentally irresponsible to continue to mine the tarsands.
While the carbon recovery programs planned for the tarsands are laudable, they would have been more so, and more trustworthy, had they been planned for ten or twenty years ago, when the tarsands were first being converted to a large-scale operation. Also, think about how the terminology has changed. It is only in the past decade that they have been called “oilsands” instead of “tar sands”, which is a decidedly less pleasant term. That’s no accident; it is the result of a PR campaign on the part of the oil companies that was arguably far more well-executed than anything an environmental group could pay for.
Will I rethink going to Alberta in the wake of this campaign? Frankly as an environmentalist, it had already crossed my mind that there were better provinces to visit in Canada first. They’re kind of preaching to the choir with me. However, I do believe that the campaign is necessary and well done in that it will teach previously unaware Americans about where their oil is coming from and how much, environmentally, it costs to produce.
I’m not sure I would characterize the comments and tweets in the blogosphere as government or industry funded – at least not this time round. It seems like they are far too widespread at this point to be the result of any concerted campaign. To be honest, the oil industry’s online efforts have been meager at best. They simply don’t get it and are afraid of the medium, leading me to hypothesize that this is mostly an organic response. BP’s campaign is probably the most sophisticated thing I’ve seen from this industry.
And while I have no proof, my suspicion is that the Re-think campaign has proved to be a rallying point not only for oil industry workers, but more importantly Albertans as a whole. With a goal to destroy the tourism industry and do serious economic damage to the province, I think that has every-day Albertans have starting to pay a lot more attention to what is being said about them online. I think this is evident of a wider trend that is developing. You can read more about it on my blog here:
http://jeremydietz.ca/2010/07/shifting-sands/
And on another note: I think it’s in poor taste that Rethink has disabled their user-comments. Whatever happened to transparency?
OK – I would argue, however, that CAPP has indeed engaged in social media campaigns and internet reputation management through this very slick site (seriously, kudos guys, even from the other side of the debate) http://www.canadasoilsands.ca/en/. The province of Alberta also has a number of articles on its own websites about the tar sands that come up in organic search, which is likely not a happy accident. In my experience nothing on the internet is.
Also, CAPP’s site above and this one (http://www.heavyoilinfo.com) come up in some seriously financed PPC campaigns on Google, and I haven’t bothered to even look on other search engines. There’s def. an effort there.
I agree that there has been an effort. Any special interest group that didn’t put forth one wouldn’t be doing its job. That being said, utilization of SEO, PPC and the oil sands websites don’t impress me much. ‘Canadasoilsands’site doesn’t even have an RSS feed afterall. To insinuate that this is coordinated backlash seems like a major stretch to me.
I can also confirm that most Albertans are hopping mad over this specific attack. As such, it makes complete sense that anti-rethink facebook comments and tweets are completely organic.
And on another note, I must say that I appreciate the tone of this conversation. It’s so much better than dealing with ‘screamers’ and ‘name callers.’
Because of this, I’d like to offer my two cents on why this campaign has touched such a nerve in Alberta.
You see, the thing with the Rethink campaign is it has targeted an entire province of people simply because they live in the same geographic location as the oil sands. Imagine if a similar campaign has been launched against California because of how it has developed its heavy oil reserves (yes – it’s a similar resource). Of course, many Californians have had nothing to do with heavy oil, yet they’re being attacked simply by association.
Well the same is true here in Alberta. The truth is that it’s a beautiful province and most of us have a deep connection with the environment. The oil sands aren’t perfect, but they’re also not as bad as they’re sometimes made out to be. Efforts are being made to clean them up, but that won’t happen overnight. And until the world can adequately function on renewables (that will be some time from now)the oil sands will continue to play a role in the world’s energy future.
In the meantime I feel that this broadly aimed attack is unfair and slanderous. If the issue is with the oil companies then bring it up with them – not the rest of the hard working Albertans out there.
Oh and one more thing – you might be able to see the oil sands’ tailings ponds from space, but the same can also be said for a car on a California freeway as well.
I agree, screaming people can never reach a comprimise. Hopefully both sides will be able to come together on this one the way that they did with the forestry industry. I really appreciate your comments and your readership – hopefully you’ll enjoy some of our other posts as well!
Hey What About The RED ZONE in the US, the race to extract natural gas in the us has defecated tens of thousands of miles of land and harmed thousands of people, so maybe the the people who started re think Alberta, may want to start a re think USA (before you accuse me, take a look at yourself)
I have a song written called “The Gasoline Song”, it tells of our addiction to the use of gasoline, a real love song that reveals what we do not want to admit.
I just want to contribute to the cause, please help me get it to the rethinkalberta.com.
How many of you people here have even been to the oil sands areas? NONE OF YOU HAVE. Otherwise, you would not be parroting the blatant BS seen in this article.
Perhaps ALL of you should really do your research a bit better, a lot better, than you have been, it is painfully obvious that you know little about what is really going on there.
How about you guys go and see what Canada as a whole contributes to CO2, and then see what percentage Alberta as a whole contributes within Canada and then see what the oil sands projects produce relative to all that, and then look at what the US produces. I DARE YOU. I know you will not, you are incapable of thinking for yourselves.
And while you are at it, be sure to take note of the many pollution sources within the US, especially around the Great Lakes areas. Your country polluted those lakes, and continue to do so. Bravo.
But hey, what do I care for your ignorance. You want to pay a bunch of terrorists from the middle east, or some socialist nutjob down in Venezuela, knock yourself out. I cannot wait for Iran to make good on their threats about cutting off the gulf from oil exports in the region. You’ll be begging for our oil eventually. And I guarantee, you will pay OUR price for the stuff when that happens.