Enbridge Shirks Its Moral Responsibility

The National Observer reports the following:

Enbridge Inc. will save $22,000 after convincing Canada's pipeline enforcement agency that it shouldn't have been punished for failing to help neighbouring landowners with property damage.

The savings will come after the National Energy Board agreed to water down a $100,000 penalty for significant damage that Alberta-based Enbridge, Canada's largest pipeline company, caused to farmland property in southwestern Manitoba during replacement work on its Line 3 pipeline in 2014.

In a newly-released decision posted on its website, the National Energy Board confirmed that it was reducing the $100,000 fine - related to the damage caused by Enbridge — to $78,000, agreeing that the rules used to impose the fine only require pipeline operators to provide "reasonable assistance" to the regulator and not the private landowners.

I'm sure all Canadians will rest easier tonight, knowing that our beleaguered oil industry is getting special consideration during these most difficult times.

Such A Delicate Balance

One of nature's most intelligent creatures, elephants, are facing an uncertain future in Burma thanks to government efforts to halt deforestation, a crucial step in trying to restore some semblance of ecological balance. However, as with all things in nature, each change, whether for good or ill, has consequences, as you will see in the following brief video.

Also, please read the accompanying story to appreciate how, like humans, when they lose their sense of purpose elephants live shorter lives and often suffer from obesity. Sound familiar?

Magical Thinking, No; Progress, Yes

As every critically-aware person well knows, we are facing some pretty daunting challenges; the most pressing is clearly climate change, more urgent with each passing day as we are regularly reminded of the ravages it is wreaking around the world. Responses continue to range from denial, complacence and magical thinking to outright proclamations of doom.

While I remain deeply pessimistic about our chances here, I am willing to embrace neither surrender nor the perspective of the pollyannas in our midst who uncritically await a technological solution or, as I like to describe it, a deus ex machina. Nonetheless, technological progress is being made, progress that will surely be part of the arsenal in our survival kit.

Now that renewable energy costs are fast approaching parity, and in some cases below parity, with fossil fuels, the next major challenge is the engineering of storage capacity so that energy can be tapped into as needed. On that front, I am happy to report that things are moving ahead at an exciting pace.

First, there is the Tesla Powerwall, a home and industrial power storage device that can store power both from renewable sources and conventional utility sources when rates are low. It has the potential, given its pricing, to ultimately supplant home generators and help curb greenhouse gas emissions in the process. And there are other similar products with various price points on the market, each with its own advantages and disadvantages and most with both domestic and industrial applications.



Battery storage is but one of several technologies that can aid in the transition to greater reliance on renewable energy sources. And the beauty of energy-storage technology is that in many cases it will obviate the need to build costly mew power stations, as it will be doing essentially the same things they do: provide power on demand.

In the UK, the first plant to store electricity by squashing air into a liquid is due to open in March, while the first steps have been taken towards a virtual power station comprised of a network of home batteries.

In case the jurisdiction does not have mountains, as required in the above system, another method would seem to effect the same benefits:

Its new £8m demonstration plant, at Pilsworth, near Manchester, and funded by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc), is set to start in March. By compressing air 700 times into a cold liquid, it stores power which is released by evaporating the liquid air into a high pressure gas to turn a turbine. The 5MW system will be able to power many thousands of homes for a few hours. Gareth Brett, CEO of Highview, says it is like pumped storage, but can be sited wherever it is needed.

There are other storage approaches being implemented as well, including using the degraded batteries of electric cars, all of which you can read about here.

I think the point demonstrated by these emerging systems is that we really can be on the verge of dramatic changes in the way we secure and store our power that will contribute to a significant lowering of the greenhouse gases that are so imperiling our world. But both imagination AND political leadership are necessary for successful transition. I am confident about the former but not so much about the latter, despite the fact that the future of our world is at stake.

UPDATED: Some Americans Sure Do Love Their Ignorance

Republican presidential hopeful Ted Cruz says we should follow the scientific evidence about climate change, and then goes on to ignore it with confabulation and obfuscation. In Cruz world, it is all just a cover for the government's desire to have total control over everyone's lives.

Some Americans sure do love and embrace their ignorance, don't they?


Cruz is a fellow traveller with the other main contenders for the Republican nomination, Donald Trump and Marco Rubio, the latter denying that climate change has anything to do with human activity. All of which serves as prelude to the acerbic Bill Maher, who offers up his own assessment of such ignorance:



UPDATE: If the above doesn't sate your political hunger, perhaps an explanation for Ted Cruz will:

Two men with mirrors and a wooden cross interrupted a campaign event in Raymond, New Hampshire to perform an exorcism on Ted Cruz on Monday, saying that the Republican presidential candidate was “possessed by a demon.”

“He’s possessed by a demon!” the man yelled. “The demon has to leave. That’s why the body is so disgusting to look at!”

A second man holding a mirror urged Cruz to look at himself so “the evil can confront itself.”

“Evil body! Evil spirit. Look yourself in the mirror!” the man said.

This is as good an explanation as any I have heard thus far for the more than passing strange nature of current U.S. politics.


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Will Any Woman Do?

There's a special place in hell for women who don't help each other.

So said the first woman to become the United States Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, at a rally for Hillary Clinton. Surely I am not the only one disgusted by the implication of that statement, that every woman has a moral obligation to support one of their own gender in her quest for the presidency, no matter how odious or inappropriate that woman might be:

While introducing Mrs. Clinton at a rally in New Hampshire on Saturday, Madeleine Albright, the first female secretary of state, talked about the importance of electing the first female president. In a dig at the “revolution” that Mr. Sanders often speaks of, she said that the first female commander in chief would be a true revolution. And she scolded any woman who felt otherwise.

“We can tell our story of how we climbed the ladder, and a lot of you younger women think it’s done. It’s not done,” Ms. Albright said of the broader fight for women’s equality. “There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other!”

Not to be outdone, veteran feminist Gloria Steinem got into the act, somewhat ironically, on Bill Maher's show:

Explaining how women tend to become more active in politics as they become older, she suggested younger women were just backing Mr. Sanders so that they could meet young men.

“When you’re young, you’re thinking, ‘Where are the boys? The boys are with Bernie,’ ” Ms. Steinem said.

Realizing that this was potentially offensive, Mr. Maher recoiled. “Oh. Now if I said that, ‘They’re for Bernie because that’s where the boys are,’ you’d swat me.”

But Ms. Steinem laughed it off, replying, “How well do you know me?”

Take a look, starting at about the 4:00 minute mark:



One hopes, as one does with men, that critical-thinking will determine how a woman votes, not gender-identification.

UPDATED: It Isn't Just About Jobs

Although we live in a time that seems to demand almost constant preoccupation with the economy and jobs, sometimes there are more important considerations, such as a country's moral standing. Right now, that moral standing is in jeopardy thanks to the apparent inflexibility of the Trudeau government on the Saudi Arabian armaments deal. While it is worth a tremendous amount of money ($15 billion), many are saying it's just not worth it.

A poll released today is instructive:

Nearly six out of 10 Canadians surveyed by Nanos Research for The Globe and Mail say they feel it is more important to ensure arms exports go only to countries “that respect human rights” than it is to support 3,000 jobs by selling weaponized armoured vehicles to Saudi Arabia.

Other countries are growing increasingly uneasy about dealing with the repressive Middle East kingdom that has little respect for human rights:

On Thursday, an all-party committee of U.K. MPs called for a suspension of British arms sales to Saudi Arabia pending a probe into Riyadh’s devastating military campaign in Yemen. A UN report last week said a Saudi-led Arab coalition has conducted “widespread and systematic” bombing of Yemeni civilians – killing more than 2,600.

Germany’s Minister of Economic Affairs and Energy Sigmar Gabriel recently signalled Berlin’s increasing unease over arms deals with Riyadh, saying in January the government needs to review future shipments. In the past 24 months, Berlin has denied key applications for arms exports to Saudi Arabia, including several hundred battle tanks and G36 rifles.

In Belgium, the head of the Flemish government, Minister President Geert Bourgeois, announced in January that he has refused an application for an export licence to ship weapons to Saudi Arabia and hinted he would continue to do so in the future.

While the Canadian government is adamant about the deal going ahead, pollster Nik Nanos believes the poll results provide an opportunity "... for the Liberals to cancel, stop, delay or modify the transaction”.

The question yet to be answered is whether Trudeau, especially in this case, is willing to put his money where his rhetoric about collaboration and transparency is.

UPDATE: Things are getting very interesting on this file:

Opponents of Canada’s $15-billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia are taking Ottawa to court in an attempt to block shipments of the combat vehicles, a move that could force the governing Liberals to explain how they justify the sale to a human-rights pariah under weapon-export restrictions.

Daniel Turp, a professor of international and constitutional law at the University of Montreal, is leading the effort, supported by students and a Montreal law firm with a record of class-action work and anti-tobacco litigation.

Turpin gives voice to what many Canadians undoubtedly feel:

“The idea that military equipment made in Canada could contribute to human-rights violations against civilians in Saudi Arabia and neighbouring countries is immoral. But we also believe that the authorization to export armoured vehicles to Saudi Arabia is illegal”.

One can only hope that at the very least, the government will be forced to lift the cloak of secrecy around whether an actual assessment of the deal was done as required by law, and if it was, what that assessment revealed.

Heartbreaking And Shameful

Given our membership in the species, all of us should feel deep shame over the actions of our fellow humans:

The town has been under attack for years by Syrian President Bashar Assad's forces, yet the rebel fighters in Moadamiyeh won't give up; so the whole town is being punished.

Pro-regime checkpoints ring Moadamiyeh, preventing food and medicine from being brought in. Cut off, the town has become filthy. Locals say disease is spreading. The power is dead.

Siege warfare is an ancient tactic. Christian crusaders did it to Muslim towns and cities. Muslim armies encircled and strangled Christian holdouts. Kings, dukes and princes besieged each other's town all across Europe.

Now, in Syria, this medieval form of warfare is making a bitter comeback. And it's not just the regime's forces who use the collective punishment of innocent civilians to achieve their military goals. Rebel forces are guilty of the same crimes.