Dear Editor:
Letter writer Mike Richardson, criticizing MP John Weston, implies that oil pipelines exporting Canadian crude oil contribute to "global greenhouse gas emissions" (Oil Will be Economy's Undoing, Aug. 5, North Shore News). This is largely untrue on a net basis.
This thesis assumes that if Canadians refuse to sell crude oil to (for example) China, the Chinese will not buy the commodity elsewhere. This is a ridiculous assumption; they will buy the commodity from another supplier, and the world greenhouse gas emissions will stay approximately the same. There might be slight differences in GHG emissions due to the crude's quality or to the cleanliness (or lack thereof) of local production and transportation practices, but these differences are generally small on a wells-to-wheels basis.
It's disappointing to see Vancouver residents unaware that tankers have run crude oil and petroleum products through Vancouver Harbour since 1915 (the start-up of Imperial's Port Moody refinery) without incident. Few know that 70 per cent of B.C.'s crude and petroleum products are imported by combinations of tankers and pipelines. All petroleum for Vancouver Island and Haida Gwaii is tankered to them, as is the case with many other B.C. ports. If these tankers and pipelines did not exist, we would all be walking or on bicycles and would have no way to get food and other goods to citizens.
Contrary to the arguments of some, environment and energy have coexisted in B.C. for nearly a century, and I believe they can continue to do so.
John Hunter North Vancouver
