Controversial campaign asks tourists to rethink Alberta and avoid another oil disaster

Campaign highlights the decimation caused by tar sands in Canada and asks tourists not to help contribute to the environmental ravages

Dubbed the ‘other oil disaster’ by environmental campaigners, tar sands are naturally occurring bitumen deposits and their exploitation in Canada is the largest energy project in the world, says campaigning organization Corporate Ethics International.

In Alberta, says the organization, there are numerous tar sands projects which:

• Are the largest contributors to the growth of greenhouse gas emissions in Canada. Will potentially destroy or degrade an area of forest the size of England to extract oil.Has created toxic lakes the size of Glasgow of contaminated water, which has been used to help extract the oil.
• Leaks up to 11m litres of contaminated water from these ponds every day into the surrounding environment and water system.
• Is estimated to result in the loss of between 6 and 166 million migratory birds over the next five decades.
• Has adversely affecting the lives of thousands of people, including local aboriginal communities, such as those in Fort Chipewyan and other communities around the Athabasca River and Lake.
• Will release more CO2 emissions each year than the whole of Ireland
• Has wreaked devastation on Michigan’s Kalamazoo River following a connected oil pipe rupture that released nearly a million gallons of oil.
• Consistently violates air pollution standards without proper enforcement by government

The campaign by Corporate Ethics International will highlight the comparisons between the pollution caused in Alberta’s tar sands with the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Britons will be encouraged to protest against the tar sands by avoiding travel to the Canadian province where oil giants BP, Shell, Exxon and Total all have mining operations.

Dr Michael Marx, executive director of Corporate Ethics, said:

“We want to lift the lid on the horrors of oil exploration taking place in a country that has a reputation for being the cleanest in the world. Tar sands mining in Alberta has not only caused irreparable damage to the environment but the health of local communities which have seen a dramatic rise in rare cancers linked to the same compounds found in tar sands operations.”

The campaign includes large digital billboards throughout London supported by online advertising and social media activity across Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.

On the rethinkalberta.com website, visitors can view a video that has gained national attention in Canada. It begins with the beauty shots that tourists associate with Alberta, which are soon interrupted by the line, “Think you know Alberta? Think again.”

The American version of the video was so powerful that the Angus Reid polling firm surveyed 4,000 individuals in Canada, the US, and the UK to assess its potential impact. After viewing the video, the poll found that 42% of Britons felt the Alberta tar sands were damaging the environment as badly as the Gulf oil spill.

Britons can send a message now that they don’t want tar sands oil in Britain or used by UK companies by:

Joining the campaign at: www.rethinkalberta.com Facebook group: Rethink-Alberta

The campaign has also started to attract wider support, Gordon Roddick, co-founder of the Body Shop and social entrepreneur, added his pledge to boycott Alberta:

“The Tar Sands fiasco is another sorry example of blatant corporate disregard of their responsibility to humanity. It rests within our responsibility to stop them.”
Jess Worth, New Internationalist co-editor and UK Tar Sands Network co-founder, added: “As people in the UK become increasingly aware of the human and environmental devastation being wreaked by the Alberta tar sands, the campaign to sever all British involvement is growing rapidly.

“In the same week as the launch of Rethink Alberta, two young women from Canadian First Nations will be joining 1000 climate activists at the Camp for Climate Action in Edinburgh, with the aim of taking action against RBS, Britain’s biggest investor in the tar sands.

“The launch of Rethink Alberta is the latest example of the way the tar sands cause is becoming a global one – because if this giant scar on the face of the land is allowed to continue growing, it will ultimately hurt us all.”

The campaign is supported by multiple environmental groups across the US, Europe and Canada, including Friends of the Earth, Earthworks, Rainforest Action Network and ForestEthics.

Corporate Ethics is an NGO based in San Francisco. It is the founding organization for the Business Ethics Network, which is comprised of over 150 NGOs that engage in corporate campaigns to make companies more environmentally and socially responsible. It is the lead strategic advisor to funders for the international tar sands campaign.

Valere Tjolle

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Valere Tjolle is editor of the Sustainable Tourism Report Suitewww.travelmole.com/stories/1143624.php