Dear Editor:
Re: Clean air important to petroleum industry, Burnaby NOW, Letters to the Editor, Aug. 15
The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers’ spokesperson claims that Canada’s oil and gas industry is not subsidized. Really?
A 2013 International Monetary Fund report, largely ignored by Canada’s corporate media, estimates such subsidies at $28 billion annually, much of it uncollected tax on externalized costs, including carbon emissions and air pollution.
The David Suzuki Foundation estimates $6.7 billion in subsidies to oil, gas and coal since Harper’s 2009 promise to end them. Even the Financial Post (May 21) admits to $211 million a year.
But we don’t need a statistics battle, just commonsense ethics. Fossil fuels are finite, non-renewable resources.
Big Oil massively dumps greenhouse gases into our atmospheric commons without offsetting the environmental damage. A transition to post-carbon energy is both desirable and inevitable.
The longer that takes, the greater the costs. Breakneck tar sands development delays that transition; subsidizing it encourages over-consumption and discourages investment in renewable energy, which creates many more jobs for money invested.
The Kinder Morgan pipeline is integral to the tar sands behemoth.
Isn’t stopping it the most ethical option?
Don’t trust Big Oil’s “facts.” For independent energy policy information, try pembina.org, or policyalternatives.ca (Climate Justice).
Bob & Angelika Hackett, Burnaby
