Oil sand. Photo source: ©© Suncor energy
Excerpts;
The on shore oil spill at the US Golf Coast and the ensuing environmental disaster, the shortage of drilling sites and high Oil prices have pushed the oil companies to look at “unconventional” hydrocarbon deposits in places such as Morocco, Jordan as well as the US . Canada’s current development of tar sands has triggered a rush by oil companies to set up similar operations in Russia, Congo and others. Canada is currently the only major center of production but investment is expanding by oil companies such as BP, Shell, Total and ENI.
However, environmental groups consider that Tar sands and oil shale to be much more damaging to the planet than normal oil operations because extraction is highly carbon- and water-intensive.
