Greenpeace environmental claims demand closer media scrutiny

GROUP HAS A KNACK FOR GETTING ATTENTION, BUT THEIR 'FACTS' CAN BE MISLEADING

By David MacLean, Edmonton Journal

October 8, 2009

You have to hand it to them -- Greenpeace has media relations down to an art.

The U. S.-based environmental group is at the top of the class when it comes to earning headlines and influencing public opinion.

But their choice to make the oilsands their Great Struggle raises some important questions.

In recent weeks, Greenpeace have employed what has become a familiar tactic to undermine Canada's oilsands industry. They hired noted environmental activist Andrew Nikiforuk to write a heavily footnoted essay on the destructiveness of Canada's oilsands industry.

The report was strategically leaked to major media outlets in advance of it being posted on the Greenpeace website. As planned, the paper was dutifully covered by the Montreal Gazette and wire service Canadian Press without a word of criticism from anyone.

"Canada becoming a global carbon bully" the Gazette headline roared. The Canadian Press headline regurgitated the Greenpeace sound bite "greenhouse gas emissions from Alberta's oilsands higher than some countries."

Give credit where credit is due: these are very clever rhetorical plays and reporters and editors fell for them --hook, line and sinker.

But readers deserve a lot more context and skepticism from Canadian media outlets.

Take, for instance, the claim that Alberta oilsands emit more CO2 than entire countries. Estonia and Lithuania are cited as examples in the report. It sounds impressive, but a quick Google search reveals that Estonia's economy is about one-tenth the size of Alberta's; it doesn't export energy around the world, and it has a population roughly equivalent to the greater Edmonton area.

If you're looking for a "global carbon bully," a better target may be Trinidad and Tobago, whose inhabitants have per-person CO2 footprints 50 per cent larger than Canadians'.

But all of this is silly puffery and gamesmanship. Greenpeace should no more go after Trinidadians because they happen to be global energy exporters than they should paint Albertans as "climate criminals."

REALITY CHECK

The reality is that Alberta and her western neighbours supply needed energy to the entire world. Creating usable energy means emitting CO2 into the atmosphere. It just so happens that the energy is made in Canada and Trinidad, and not in Estonia.

Recall that at least two-thirds of the CO2 emitted from oilsands crude is emitted by the end user -- you, the driver. When Greenpeace decries CO2 emissions from Alberta oilsands, remember that nearly 70 per cent of the emissions are created by soccer moms driving their kids to practice in New York, Montreal, Toronto, or any other community that buys fuel from Alberta's oilsands. It's like blaming farmers for obesity.

QUESTION FOR GREENPEACE

If U. S.-based Greenpeace and their Canadian enablers want to drag Canada's good name through the mud around the world for the sake of a good headline, by all means, let them.

But let's make sure we ask them why there are no protesters chaining themselves to equipment in Venezuela's Orinoco Belt, where a "tarsand" deposit rivalling Alberta's lies beneath ancient rain forests and is being rapidly developed.

Greenpeace has an office in Edmonton (in addition to other offices in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver) dedicated to protesting the oilsands, yet they don't have a single office in the entire South American country of Venezuela.

California, where Greenpeace maintains an office in San Francisco, produces around 150 million barrels per year of heavy oil from bitumen deposits with carbon emissions similar to or greater than Canada's, yet those California fields have been operating without interruption since 1899.

Every week, on average, China builds a new coal-fired power plant. Dangerous working conditions cost the lives of more than 5,000 coal workers each year in addition to untold global environmental damage, yet paid Greenpeace staff unfurl banners with slogans decrying energy production in Edmonton and not in Xingjiang.

FACTS NOT FACTOIDS, PLEASE

 Greenpeace and their allies are entitled to their opinions about Canada's energy industry, but are not entitled to their own facts.

Their assertions must be challenged by provincial and federal politicians and industry with verifiable facts.

An objective Canadian media should require them to justify their statements to the world by offering practical alternatives, particularly when they attack us on our own soil.

 

David MacLean is vice-president of the Alberta Enterprise Group, a non-profit, member-driven public policy advocacy group. For more information in AEG, visit www.albertaenterprise.ca