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How much destruction needs to be caused before we understand the concept that greed does not equal ‘good’. Our relentless hunt for oil has potentially sacrificed a great big chunk of the Louisiana coastline to unctuous death.
The CBC reports:
“British energy company BP Plc. said it was “unlikely that an accidental surface or subsurface oil spill would occur” from the well it was proposing to drill 80 kilometres off the Louisiana shore. And if such a spill did occur, the company said, “due to the distance to shore and the response capabilities that would be implemented, no significant adverse impacts are expected.”
Ah ha! Well, I mean the oil that down there is pretty easy to reach, and we can make a great profit by extracting it. Let’s lowball the safety concerns and work our corporate connections to the EPA and US government and see if we can grease the right palms and get this bad boy going to make some money.
“Last week, the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded and then collapsed into the Gulf of Mexico, rupturing the wellhead and sending forth 5,000 barrels a day of oil into the sea.”
“At least six million litres of petroleum have spilled so far, according to U.S. Coast Guard estimates, making it one of the worst U.S. oil spills in decades. Tens of thousands of animals, including birds and marine life, living along the southeast U.S. coast are at risk.”
Well, the other shoe just dropped. Guess who is going to get the short end of the stick? Can you even put a price on wiping out a large portion of the biosphere? Wildlife be damned.
“Remaining oil from the slick, which measures about 1,500 square kilometres, is expected to wash ashore in Mississippi on Saturday before reaching Alabama on Sunday and Florida on Monday, putting those areas at risk of environmental catastrophe.”
“BP officials have said it could take as long as 90 days to stop the leak, meaning as many as 71.5 million litres of petroleum could ultimately get into the water — far more than the 41 million litres dumped by the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster, the worst oil spill in U.S. history”
Hmmm. It seems this is making the Exxon Valdez look like small potatoes. I wonder, once the southern US shores are coated with oil, how silly renewable energy is going to be looking? Probably just as silly, because those damn hippies do not know what they are talking about.
“London-based BP, which had contracted the drilling rig, is fully responsible for funding the cleanup.”
I wonder if the US government is going to charge them for the cleanup efforts undertaken by government agencies. I certainly hope so.
I consider myself to be a progressive of a sort. I’m all for saving the earth and all that, but then I observe the goings on at the Sustainable Campuses conference here at the UofA all I can think of is ‘What the hell is the point?’.
I mean really, all we have here is the proto-educated elite coming together to make some noises about sustainability, recycling and earth saving in general to each other confirming their ‘green ethos’ and noble intent; a perfidious waste of time, but I imagine it looks darn good on the CV/resume.
I can guarantee that this cohort, like the previous and the one before that, will have their high expectations and noble goals quashed by the reality of the situation facing them ahead in their life path.
Being the educated elite they will gravitate toward the upper middle class of society, reaping the benefits and privileges of that socioeconomic station. Only a very few will retain their ‘earth-friendly’ principles; most will happily defile the earth and others in the maintenance of their lifestyle thus propagating the cycle.
Lifestyle maintenance will be the end of us all.
Who wants to sacrifice comfort and security for the greater good? Is that ethos even mentioned anymore in this capitalistic money based society anymore? Why think of others when you can have a new big screen TV (insert techno gizmo/must have here)?
I’m certain that some good does come of such gatherings. Raising consciousness and what not. Incremental change is all that we can hope for, but unfortunately incremental change will not be enough. Nor will the small progressive changes happen soon enough or on a significant scale to change the sodden downward spiral of our crumbling civilization. When we finally flame out and the human population inevitably crashes only then will lessons be learned. Mmmm… society based on greed and exploitation, not a good thing. It worked so well as long as resources were available. Not so good once said resources were all exhausted. On our ruined shell of a planet, at least we can be proud of the fact we recycled our paper cups (at least some of the time).
bleatmop
Mystro
Dead Wild Roses 
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