April 26th, 2007 Andrew Cash
A smog alert on Earth Day?
By Andrew Cash
When Earth Day meets smog, does anybody hear? Apparently not.
Even as I order my first pint of the patio season and celebrate a glorious day, I try to ignore the evidence: itchy eyes, sore throat.
Winter is finally over, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let minor health concerns ruin the party. But the Danforth’s perpetual weekend bumper-to-bumper car rally is giving me and my two-year-old the season’s first dose of sun-baked exhaust.
So when a friend e-mails me later to let me know that at the exact hour I was one with my urban environment, smog readings in T.O. were bad enough to issue an air advisory, it makes sense. What doesn’t is that the province’s air quality watchdog took a pass on letting citizens know.
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April 19th, 2007 Andrew Cash
Real dirt on the tar sands
Tories are pumping a fivefold increase in production while we worry ourselves sick about leaf blowers
By Andrew Cash
It’s no wonder Stephen Harper can’t say “Kyoto” without choking. After all, thanks to the huge oil sands deposit in his Alberta backyard, we’ve got the second-largest oil reserves in the entire world, next to Saudi Arabia.
You probably already know that the sticky goo in northeastern Alberta is the fastest-growing source of greenhouse gas emissions in the country. But while we’re all worrying ourselves sick about leaf blowers and incandescent bulbs, few realize the extent of the oil sands expansion being plotted. Do voters get that the Conservatives are expecting, and indeed pumping, a massive fivefold increase?
Welcome to the difference between official Harperspeak about going green and Tory tar sands machinations. And the politics are especially thick and sticky when Washington is factored in, since no matter who we elect, stopping any further development of our bituminous riches, or even slowing it down, is going to take a heroic rewiring of the Canada/U.S. power dynamic.
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