No one out there needs reminding of how difficult it is to produce petroleum in Canada these days. The regulatory quagmire and relentless attacks from well-organized opponents are the most visible obstacles. Other impediments are equally frustrating, like, for example, the media’s refusal to comment on just how valuable natural gas is to BC at this very moment, and how oddly backwards it is for many to be condemning fossil fuels at the very moment they are in grave danger of not having them. But what is hardest to take in one sense, is the relentless tide of poor information emanating from otherwise credible sources, the third-rate pseudo-analyses that flow effortlessly providing mountains of faulty reference points for petroleum’s opponents. Producers are forced to watch commentators on the national media scene pontificate on things from afar, things they clearly don’t understand very well at all. Last week the Globe and Mail served up a heaping shovelful of such detritus. In a piece entitled “ Record low Canadian crude price is a clue that oil sands’ best days are past ,” the paper grunted its way through a damaging and ignorant opinion piece, adding fuel to a completely unnecessary fire. […]
