An Open Letter to Canada's Environment Minister

Dear Mr. Prentice,

I am very concerned about Canada's participation in the United Nations Climate Change Conference - COP15. With the recent revelation that many key climate scientists involved in the IPCC may have misrepresented data, and ruthlessly squelched opposing perspectives to anthropogenic global warming, I think it is absolutely imperative for Canada to avoid entangling ourselves in this thinly veiled pretext to implement a supra-national framework for global governance called "cap-and-trade."

Canada cannot afford to sign treaties on the basis of an unproven "chicken little" scenario, no matter how shrill the shouts of believers in their attempts to silence dissent.

Please consider the voices of these scientists before embroiling Canada in a policy created by doomsayers:
http://www.petitionproject.org/

Regards,
Al Cruikshank

Oil recovery to be taxpayer subsidized?

Back when environmentalists were raising the alarm about a coming ice age and anti-war activists had us fearing a nuclear winter, chemical engineers like my father were engaged in "carbon capture and storage" profitably, for the oil industry.

My father worked for a large oil company at the time known as Dresser Industries. Dresser's operations based in Edmonton, like many other oil servicing companies of the time was engaged in an enhanced oil recovery technology pioneered by Royal Dutch Shell in 1972 then called "CO2 injection." Today the industry prefers to call CO2 injection "carbon capture and storage (CCS)."

Now that Alberta's provincial government is planning on making CCS a showcase of its Climate Change Strategy, should we expect the 2 billion dollars the Alberta Government is planning on spending to create the infrastructure to pump CO2 to oil fields will come from any additional revenues Albertans anticipated from our new oil royalty regime?

Though I am tempted to address the tenuous foundation of anthropogenic global warming, I ask environmentalists why the government is willing to pay for the collection and distribution of CO2, a raw material the oil industry paid for since 1972, so that same industry can extract more combustible hydrocarbons generating more CO2? With "climate change" initiatives like this one, it is no wonder multinational corporations like BP are on board.

Global warming.

Some believe that all truth and reality are subjective. This is a false belief. Truth does not care if you choose to ignore it. No amount of unbelief in the law of gravity is going to change the consequences of jumping off a cliff.

Well, in science you better not call something a truth that is only rooted in a philosophy or belief, no matter how authoritative the source.

Years ago, a church messed around with the domain of astronomy by pronouncing that the earth was the center of the universe. Being as this church used its authority to impose its dogma on the state, people suffered. Those who publicly challenged this dogma were even branded as heretics, and were persecuted for their beliefs.

Nowadays, many scientists are calling anthropogenic global warming, "an inconvenient truth." Some have even advocated silencing heretics who challenge this "truth." Most of these same scientists wish to use the power of the state to reverse the alleged consequences of this "truth." Sounds like dogma to me. Sounds like their proposed prescriptions might be worse than the illness.

However, giving these scientists the benefit of the doubt I ask, "why not adapt?" Here in Canada, we are liable to have a net benefit from global warming. More arable land, an open northwest passage, and a more moderate climate would be welcome by many a Canadian and tourist alike. Also, needing less fuel to heat our homes may result in cleaner air.

Most animals can adapt too. Some won't. My thoughts drift to a photo of a bunch of "stranded" polar bears on an iceberg. Its not like polar bears haven't ended up on icebergs before. If some bears are so dumb they don't know when to get off, maybe they deserve to be removed from the gene pool.

In a future blog, I'll discuss a legitimate place for dogma.