Declare tar sands a non-option for T&T

A few weeks ago, on April 10, Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu, writing in the UK Guardian, called for an anti-apartheid-style campaign against fossil fuel companies. “It is clear that those countries and companies primarily responsible for emitting carbon and accelerating climate change are not simply going to give up; they stand to make too much money”.  

He was responding to a report from the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that warns the world is on the verge of climate catastrophe and that it is “unequivocally” proven humans are to blame. To avert disaster, the report states, investment in fossil fuels must start falling by tens of billions of dollars a year. The Archbishop understood that rather than do the right thing, and invest in renewable energy technology, oil companies will continue to pursue the fossil fuels they know best. 

Faced with dwindling oil reserves oil companies are investing their futures in hard-to-reach, difficult-to-exploit and dirty fuels. I’m sure the good Archbishop had no idea that two days before, an excellent example of fossil-fuel lobbing appeared in the Trinidad Express in a column titled Future investment opportunity that can’t be ignored…tar sands. The writer “strongly” urges the Minister of Energy and Energy Affairs, Kevin Ramnarine, to take a stand on exploiting tar sands in the south of Trinidad. 

http://www.guardian.co.tt/digital/new-members