{"id":11248,"date":"2013-09-06T18:31:54","date_gmt":"2013-09-07T01:31:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/?p=11248"},"modified":"2013-09-07T00:57:40","modified_gmt":"2013-09-07T07:57:40","slug":"undercover-tar-sands-site-what-its-like","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/undercover-tar-sands-site-what-its-like\/","title":{"rendered":"Undercover @ Tar Sands Site: What It’s Like"},"content":{"rendered":"

Conditions at ground Zero for Canada\u2019s controversial pipelines<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Tar Sands<\/p><\/div>\n

In recent months, many climate activists have focused their efforts on Canada\u2019star sands<\/a>\u00a0and the companies set on extracting fossil fuels from them. With the debate raging louder than ever, this article is from contact with one of the workers helping to build a pipeline to bring oil from the\u00a0tar sands\u00a0to the U.S. Read on for that anonymous correspondent\u2019s second dispatch from one of the world\u2019s most controversial jobs.<\/em><\/p>\n

On its surface, Fort McMurray, Alberta, looks like any other small Canadian city, with rows of new houses,\u00a0condo developments\u00a0and a Wal-Mart. Recycling bins line the streets, and residents schlep cloth bags to the store because the community banned\u00a0plastic bags. But there\u2019s one big difference between Fort Mac and other towns: This is\u00a0ground zero\u00a0for Canada\u2019s controversial tar sands operations. Like tens of thousands of others, I saw green in the tar-like bitumen-drenched sand, and I came here to cash in. (I\u2019m writing anonymously to protect my colleagues, my friends and myself.)<\/p>\n

Read Undercover Correspondent\u2019s First Dispatch from the Tar Sands<\/a><\/p>\n

The majority of oil-related work happens north of town. Follow Highway 63 for about 20 minutes and you\u2019ll see a sprawling series of smoke stacks at the Syncrude Canada Ltd. processing facility. You can smell the oil in the air, and smog hangs across the otherwise crisp northern horizon. Drive further, and things get even worse.\u00a0Koch Carbon\u2019s giant pile of petroleum coke in Detroit<\/a>\u00a0is nothing compared to what the oil companies have up here. Shell, Imperial Oil, Exxon, Encana, Husky, BP, Suncor Energy, CNR, Southern Pacific and Petro-Canada all have a stake in this game, and there\u2019s an estimated 170 billion barrels of crude on the line.<\/p>\n

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\nThousands of employees are put up in temporary housing settlements. The big \u201ccamps\u201d have gyms and rec rooms with pool and ping pong tables; a few even have ice rinks, yoga classes and movie theaters. For the most part, though, it\u2019s all insulated aluminum-sided trailers with private sleeping quarters and communal bathrooms.<\/p>\n

The camps serving Shell\u2019s Albian Sands project and Imperial Oil\u2019s Kearl work site are among the biggest. Shell\u2019s complex \u2013 two camps collectively known as \u201cthe Village\u201d \u2013 is home to about 2,500 employees. Meanwhile, Imperial Oil\u2019s Wapasu camp houses more than 7,300. It even has its own airstrip to accommodate workers as they fly in and out on chartered 747’s.<\/p>\n

Wapasu is a dry camp, meaning absolutely no alcohol is allowed. Employees are bused in and out of the fenced, guarded compound for work, and aren\u2019t allowed to leave or have visitors during off-hours. Meanwhile, all rooms are subject to search. There\u2019s nothing like coming home from a long day\u2019s work, only to find a note stating drug-sniffing dogs searched your room while you were away. Some jokingly refer to Wapasu as \u201cWapatraz.\u201d Over at the Village, things aren\u2019t quite as harsh. There\u2019s even a bar onsite \u2013 but it closes early, and you\u2019re not allowed to have more than two drinks per night.<\/p>\n

Living in a camp means you get free room and board, including three substantial meals a day. But if you\u2019re not careful, the isolation and boredom can wear on you. Many of us get stuck paying inflated prices for cigarettes or smuggled-in drugs and alcohol. There are stories of late-night card games where guys bet \u2013 and lose \u2013 entire paychecks just for a rush.<\/p>\n

Back in Fort McMurray, most of us out-of-towners stay in hotels or overpriced apartments. We\u2019re all given a generous union-approved stipend to pay for lodging (and a nice per diem to cover restaurant meals), so if you play your cards right, you can pocket a nice chunk of change. Living out of a hotel room gets old fast, but it beats the hell out of staying in a camp.<\/p>\n

Driving is incredibly dangerous in the tar sands, and Highway 63 is known locally as \u201cthe Highway of Death.\u201d Fatalities are common, with one death every 1.3 months, on average. There is no bypass around the city, so all the heavy equipment heading to the tar sands has to roll right through Fort McMurray. Logging trucks look small and harmless compared to the massive rigs hauling satellite-sized machinery and components. The biggest load to ever grace the Canadian highway system \u2013 an 859-ton module that was bigger than two Olympic swimming pools \u2013 passed through earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Most of us drive $8-a-gallon gas-guzzling 4x4s, but most of us also have company gas cards, so fuel economy isn\u2019t much of a concern. There\u2019s always a line-up at the Tim Horton\u2019s drive-through, where it can take 30 minutes to get a goddamn coffee. When our crew gathers for our daily meeting, almost everyone leaves their truck running.<\/p>\n

One of my coworkers saw me turn off the ignition on a particularly brisk February morning. \u201cDid you just turn off your truck?!\u201d he asked in disbelief. \u201cWhat are you, some sort of\u00a0environmentalist<\/em>?\u201d<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t know what to say. I once considered myself somewhat of an environmentalist \u2013 I recycle, use energy-efficient light bulbs, and have a compost\u00a0back home. But here I am, in Fort McMurray, working for Big Oil. I guess I\u2019ve sort of sold out. What can I say? Even environmentalists have bills to pay.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Conditions at ground Zero for Canada\u2019s controversial pipelines In recent months, many climate activists have focused their efforts on Canada\u2019star sands\u00a0and the companies set on extracting fossil fuels from them. With the debate raging louder than ever, this article is … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11248"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11248\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11256,"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11248\/revisions\/11256"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/amicuscuria.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}