Today we hear about a scientific advance that appears set to create a new type of clean, cheap, biological battery that may one day power everything from pace makers to cell phones. We’ll also travel to northern Alberta to hear from residents of the Peace River region who have raised concerns about strong odours emanating from nearby petrochemical facilities and their potential impact on people’s health.
NWB, you make a good point about the relative enmorinvental costs of oil sands versus ANWR. What nobody seems to take notice of, however, is that in both cases the lands involved are in the hands of governments, not private parties, so decisions regarding them are both bureaucratic and heavily influenced by political considerations – desires for revenues, citizen concerns, and the relative power of competing enery/enviro interest groups.If we truly lived in market economies and the resources were in private hands, we would certainly see different development decisions, and greater cooperation between the competing interest groups.Instead, we are moving rapidly towards stronger central government influence on all business decisions, which leads both to greater politicization of decisions and to greater likelihood of opacity and backroom deals.