Time for Canadians to cash in, eh?

Alberta is about to get wildly rich and powerful

What does that mean for Canada?

STEVE MAICH

At Suncor Energy's Millennium oil sands project, just north of Fort McMurray, Alta., the unmistakable odour of black gold drifts up from the ground and hangs thick in the air. Everywhere around you, water pooled in footprints, tire ruts and potholes carries the telltale rainbow sheen of oil. "The smell of economic progress," jokes Brad Bellows, a spokesman for Suncor, playing host on a damp spring afternoon. But it's much more than that. It's the smell of raw power -- the kind that comes from having plenty of what the rest of the world can't live without. It's the smell of a resource locked in the ground for millions of years and which now has the potential to shape the future of a nation, for better or for worse.

Suncor's extraction plant on the bank of the Athabasca River looks like a science fiction movie set -- hundreds of kilometres of steel pipe twisted into incomprehensible knots around hulking industrial buildings, storage tanks and smokestacks. The whole scene is bathed in a constant haze of steam and exhaust. Two other such plants are now operating within an hour's drive of here, and several more are scheduled to commence operations over the next few years, all to exploit what may be the biggest petroleum deposit anywhere in the world, a sea of oil-saturated soil covering an area the size of New Brunswick.

http://www.macleans.ca/topstories/bu..._107308_107308

It's everywhere, it's everywhere.

Hmmmm

I wonder when Alberta will declare independence from Canada!

I wonder when the United States will take that oil.

I dont think this is too much of a big news: I knew AB had oil reserves already. Anyways those guys rock. A kind of "American Canada" surrounded by a huge "European Canada".

Originally Posted by Italian Guy

I dont think this is too much of a big news: I knew AB had oil reserves already. Anyways those guys rock. A kind of "American Canada" surrounded by a huge "European Canada".

I don't understand

Originally Posted by Rabs

I wonder when the United States will take that oil.

damn it....you beat me to it

Originally Posted by Renegade

I don't understand

I'm sorry my bad. You know AB is Canada's conservative stronghold. They have a pretty strong movement which promotes the secession of the province into either independence or integration with the US. AB is the only province of Canada where you can find a majority of Bush supporters. They still do rodeos and are truely attached to the idea of an old North America. Albertans beleieve in less State, lower taxes, and private services. The rest of Canada, well you know about it. Some sort of France revisited. Thats why the rest of Canadians look down on those "rough" rednecks of AB. Note: AB is one of the richest, if not THE richest, province.

AB is like the only province without a provincial debt and have billions of surplus even after giving other provinces billions in a equlizatoin program.

AB people is a bit different from the rest of Canada, they are just so much more conservative and religious. You wouldn't tell much difference if you put a AB man in U.S.

Originally Posted by Rabs

I wonder when the United States will take that oil.

Let's stick to facts and opinions rather than baited comments.