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addicted to fossil fuels?

What ts hydraulic fracturing and how ts it hurting Canada’s
chance to move towards alternative sources of energy?

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pu to the 1970s, harvesting
of natural resources was a
new and developing industry,
and many environmental
regulations and social concerns
about the environment did

not exist. The continued
complacency within the
Canadian government towards
the true, lived costs of harvesting
energy is extremely worrisome.
One has to wonder if politicians
are truly naive to consequences

By Koy Tayler, Contributor

associated with the consumption
of fossil fuels or if, despite
knowing so, are greedy enough to
destroy the environment.

In the decades after the
initial energy boom in Canada,
corporations began moving
towards an as yet largely
untapped natural resource:
natural gas. The growing
consensus of the negative
environmental consequences
associated with burning fossil
fuels put pressure on the energy
industry. Traditional methods of
harvesting energy were no longer

     
   
   
   
     

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a part of how society wanted to
progress, consequently putting
the industry and its morals into
question.

The energy industry began
developing a technique to extract
natural gas. Hydraulic fracturing
would allow them to market their
industry as, to put it generously,
environmentally conscious.

Hydraulic fracturing is
much like it sounds. Large rocks
below the surface are fractured
to release shale gas, where it
can then be liquefied to make
transportation to market easier.
Natural gas is cleaner than
traditional fossil fuels such as
oil and coal. This fact is the
main way the public is being
manipulated into allowing the
energy industry and government
use and destroy obscene amounts
of resources to extract this

material. As consumers of large
amounts of energy it is easy to
get comfortable and complacent
when it comes to how and where
our resources come from. This
needs to change and citizens
must take action.

Energy corporations do
not advertise the external costs
involved in the production of
natural gas, not added to the
dollar value that consumers
pay, such as the environmental
or health consequences of
pollution. These are referred
to as externalities and the non-
disclosure of them presents