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July-August 2017

Canadians need better protection from oil sands cleanup liabilities

The future for oil sands mining is uncertain at best, but companies must account for the social and environmental costs now

Jodi McNeill@jodi_lm3

This year, Canada celebrates its 150th birthday. Ours is a country of rich history—but not all Canadian stories are told equally. In this special report, This tackles 13 issues—one per province and territory—that have yet to be addressed and resolved by our country in a century and a half Canada’s oil sands have long been a lightning rod […] More »
January-February 2012

When Canada’s biggest businesses need access in Washington, they call lobbyist Paul Frazer

Lyndsie Bourgon

Paul Frazer is an invisible Canadian. He doesn’t live in Canada, and hasn’t for more than two decades. But he works for us, and he represents us abroad, and he holds sway over the leaders and big businesses that affect our lives. In many ways, he has power over the powerful. But here at home, […] More »
March-April 2011

Photo Essay: Fort Chipewyan lives in the shadow of Alberta’s oil sands

Ian WillmsWebsite

The residents of Fort Chipewyan, Alberta, live downstream from the most destructive industrial project on earth. A portrait of a community in peril Canada’s oil sands are the largest and most environmentally destructive industrial project in the world. So far, oil sands development has eliminated 602 square kilometers of Boreal forest and emits 29.5 million […] More »

Wednesday WTF: Big oil clumsily co-opts lefty lingo

Mary Dirmeitis

The “ethical oil” campaign is at it again, trying to convince consumers that by supporting tar sands production, they are saving the world from those scary Saudi women-haters. But this time, they have gone so far in appropriating the language the left, I actually thought the ads were spoofs. Without batting an eyelash, these ads […] More »
July-August 2011

As election looms, cracks appear in Alberta’s 40-year right-wing dynasty

Jen GersonWebsite

At Marv’s Classic Soda Shop, Marvin Garriott, known for his oiled handlebar moustache, is often asked to speak of politics. He’s the local prophet on the subject; all small towns have one. A two-term councillor sitting for the 1,900-person Southern Alberta town of Black Diamond, Garriott poses for tourists and reporters, mugging in a bowling-alley […] More »
July-August 2010

How Canwest helped Shell Oil greenwash its tar sands business

Raina DelisleWebsite

Shell Canada’s operations in Alberta’s oil sands are clean and green, and simply the victim of nasty rumours spread by environmentalists trying to tar the company’s reputation. That is, if you believe the “six-week Canwest special information feature on climate change, in partnership with Shell Canada.” Canada’s largest media company teamed up with the oil […] More »

Ezra Levant: Greenpeace should be prosecuted as a criminal organization

nick taylor-vaisey

Conservative provocateur Ezra Levant suggested in a Calgary Sun column last week that, according to Section 467.1 of the Criminal Code, Greenpeace should be prosecuted as a criminal organization. That section of the Code defines a “criminal organization” as a group numbering more than three people in or outside Canada that “has as one of its […] More »
July-August 2010

As green-collar jobs boom, Canada is mired in the tar sands

Jessica Leigh JohnstonWebsite

Canada and Abu Dhabi share one big trait: an economy addicted to oil. But while Canada doubles down on the tar sands, the emirate quietly plans a renewable energy hub in a gleaming zero-emissions city in the desert. Can either of these bets pay off? Looking out over the site of Masdar City in Abu […] More »

As BP's oil floods the Gulf Coast, Chevron prepares to drill even deeper in Canada

jesse mintz

Even as the Deepwater Horizon spill releases an estimated 25,000 barrels of crude oil a day into the Gulf of Mexico—making it, in some experts’ estimates, an even greater ecological disaster then 1989 Exxon Valdez spill—Chevron Canada Ltd. is pursuing plans to create one of the deepest offshore oil wells in the world off the […] More »
July-August 2008

An Alberta sculptor fights oil companies to exhibit art on his own land

Amy FungWebsite

As you walk through Peter von Tiesenhausen’s land, artwork emerges as if summoned from the ground up. Ships and nests made of willow branches appear along well-worn paths. Statues carved from logs stand watch from between the trees. In Tiesenhausen’s studio, small canvases that resemble the cracked earth of recent droughts are propped across the […] More »

Exclusive: When Ontarians conserve power, wind farms will be first to shut down

darcy higgins

Despite its recent investment in wind energy, Ontario will periodically ask wind operators to turn off their turbines, leaving gas and nuclear operating, This Magazine has learned. Conservation efforts and more energy production have led to an occasional surplus of electricity in the province, requiring Ontario to power down some generators at certain times of […] More »