Demonstration against the Northern Gateway Pipeline,
Comox, Vancouver Island, March 31, 2012
Here is a mosaic of my photos and two short video clips from this rally that
took place outside of the community centre in which the
Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline hearings took place.
It was not long after Prime Minister Harper tried to cast all the opponents
of this pipeline and similar projects as dangerous radicals and extremists (see
here, or
here or here).
This caused great displeasure among peaceful environmentalists many of whom
were showing it also at this rally:
Based on the area filled with the participants and assuming about 3 people per square metre, my estimate of the number of participants of this "Our Coast, Our Decision -- No pipelines, No tankers" rally was close to 2,000. This rabble.ca report of the Comox hearings/rally puts it at over 2,200.
If we eliminated all the energy waste that our society got accustomed to, no extraction of the tar sands oil should be needed. Even if one comes to the conclusion that more tar sands oil needs to be extracted (as a means to carry us over till alternative energy sources are developed), it does not make any sense, it is against the national interests of Canada, to export it all unrefined abroad, and destroy in the process the sensitive areas of the Northern BC. Especially when the already existing Edmonton-to-Vancouver Kinder Morgan pipeline is also proposed to be twinned and greatly expanded. Everything that is extracted in Alberta should be refined locally. No new pipeline must be built, and the moratorium on supertankers in BC waters must be made permanent. Projects of this scale should be decided by referenda.
