Beware.... Rant below.

  A friend of mine argued a year or so ago that we should stop buying oil from Saudi Arabia...  that it was expensive and we could do better.   My response included that one must also keep in mind that ANY oil is expensive to us consumers, yes, but ultimately also deleterious to the environment not only for the globally shared combustion products of carbon dioxide and pollutive N compounds, but also on a more locally point source viewpoint, as well…       Consider the oil sands area of Canada where my group is doing ecological impact research and where I am now breathing the air.   Canada, this benign country to our north, was the biggest supplier of oil to the US last year and it continues this year -- According to the DOE, Canada remained the largest exporter of total petroleum in June, exporting 2.733 million barrels per day to the United States, which is an increase from May (2.527 thousand barrels per day). The second largest exporter of total petroleum was Saudi Arabia with 1.353 million barrels per day (http://www.eia.doe.gov).  Much of this oil is coming from the oil sands in Alberta where they are both strip-mining the forests and wetlands and using in-situ steam methods to acquire the raw materials.  The processing of these oil sands produces vast amounts of slag in the form of contaminated sand (2 tons of sand yield one barrel of oil) and huge piles of sulfur that they protect with loud cannons so that birds won’t unsuspectingly land and die in these highly contaminated areas.  They use copious amounts of water from the Athabasca River to release the oil from the sands and divert natural resources from the local people.  These indigenous people are being greatly affected not only in their loss of hunting grounds and water supply, but the water supply that they do receive back from this area seems to be tainted -- the fish in the area around the indigenous town of Fort Chepewyan (north of Fort McMurray) are developing growths and losing flesh.  In a population of 1200 people in this town and surrounding areas, there were 6 deaths in Feb 2008 from cancer.  The cancer rate there is above what one would expect, however, more studies must be done says the government.

    I propose not only NOT buying gas from Saudi Arabia, but also trying to limit use of petroleum based energy resources in general. 
   With that, I relinquish my soap box.   And perhaps have a beer.