Impact of Fossil Fuels

[ Excerpt from: "U.S. mayors denounce oilsands," by Mike De Souza, Canwest News Service, June 23, 2008 ]

Mayors from the U.S.'s largest cities... called for a crackdown on fuels that could cause catastrophic global warming.

In a resolution adopted in Miami at the U.S. Conference of Mayors annual meeting, municipal leaders called for new national guidelines to track the life-cycle impact of different types of fossil fuels. They also urged their member cities to stop using unconventional sources of energy with a large carbon footprint such as liquid coal or oil shale for their own municipal operations.



(Syncrude's Mildred Lake plant north of Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada, is the largest oilsands crude oil production facility in the world. Photograph by: Chris Schwarz/Edmonton Journal)


"The production of tarsands oil from Canada emits approximately three times the carbon dioxide pollution per barrel as does conventional oil production and significantly damages Canada's Boreal forest ecosystem - the world's largest carbon storehouse," said the resolution.

Jennifer Hosterman, mayor of Pleasanton, Calif., said the mayors wanted to send a message that cities are taking action to stop the concentration of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere from reaching dangerous levels that could seriously disrupt the living systems on earth...

The resolution coincided with the launch of a website on Monday from Canadian oilsands producers (www.canadasoilsands.ca) to beef up their environmental and social image.

The motion was co-sponsored by mayors from a dozen cities, including San Francisco, Austin, Texas, and Des Moines, Iowa...

.. Das Williams, a member of the city council from Santa Barbara, California, said that politicians should invest in conservation efforts and alternatives instead of promoting Western Canada's oilsands as a solution to energy security in North America.

"I think that both the people of Canada and the people of the United States are going to have to face some tough choices in the coming years of whether they expand domestic supplies or whether they conserve and invest in alternatives," said Williams, whose city is committed to becoming fossil free by 2020. "When you realize that you're addicted to something that isn't healthy for your civilization, that doesn't mean that you can quit overnight necessarily. But it does mean that what you have to do is focus on reducing your dependence."