So basically there's more coal - so it'll damage the earth more?

There you go. Much, much, much more.

But "it'll" is not the whole thing. "It'd", if it was all mined and burned is nearer to what the model was looking at. A preposterous notion.

What's odd about that?
Lots of people pretend to care about things when they don't really care enough to act on it.

British Columbians have "Beautiful BC" on their car plates - they are proud of the fact.
Indeed it is beautiful but what do they do to keep it that way?
Victoria, the capital city, hasn't even got a secondary sewage system.

I think that makes my point.
Canadians, just like everyone else, would love to be green as long as it doesn't cost anything.

The funny thing is, it doesn't. Canadians could make money hand over fist if they'd just shake off this crippling "hewers of wood and exploiters of stuff underground" crap. It's about time they grew up.

Thanks.

All part of the service.

It is true that being green can be cost effective in the end but as you point out, it takes a big change of mindset.

Politicians have a short term attitude.
The investment that might have to be made to make the required changes may not pay off within that parliament, so they are not interested in it.

Also, the involvement of big business (and there are few as big as the fossil fuel business) in politics means that politicians are unlikely to block environmentally unfriendly activities when they are held in thrall by the oil and gas companies.

No argument there. One does what one can to influence things. All politics is local it's been said.

Do you think that being next door to the Americans has had an effect on Canada's withdrawal from Kyoto and their current stance on issues like the oil sands?

Doing what exactly?

Canada tried to shake off that image years ago. A decade or so back it was indeed the case that manufacturing had overtaken the resource industries, at least in terms of exports. It seems to be going back the other way now.

Indeed. I should probably leave this thread alone, but I'm sure many people heard Andrew Weaver explain his study on CBC Radio this morning.

What he said was fine, but nonetheless on the CBC evening news we had a CAPP (Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers) hack announcing that a leading Canadian climate scientist says that the oil sands aren't a problem for global warming. It's all coal.

Andrew, I didn't think you were so naive. <shakes head>

Ah, the lovely oilsands people. I talked to them about five years ago when I was doing some work on petroleum coke. Oilsands processing generates vast quantities of petcoke. Some is used on-site as a fuel. It can't really be sold because the logistics would be a nightmare.

Most is "stockpiled for future use", I was told.

I prefer the word "landfilling".

Erm. Are you going to answer the question posed above?

As soon as government began to provide the majority of science funding it became a political tool.

Lots of people talk about Eisenhower's 'military industrial complex' warning in his farewell address, but few remember the other part where he warned of the corruption of science by government funds. He was well ahead of his time in both respects.