Can Canada Neutralise Russia's Energy Blackmail?

Russia has never hesitated to act the bully whenever it was in a position to do so. Putin's invasion and ethnic cleansing in Georgia was just the latest in his attempts to control all energy flowing westward to Europe from the Caspian and central Asia. Is it possible that meek and mild Canada might play a significant role in neutralising Putin's bombastic threats of a new and dangerous cold war?

A new Cold War looms, many are concluding, financed by Russia’s new found energy wealth and fueled by appeasement. Is the free world doomed to decades of hostility due to Europe’s energy vulnerability?....Alberta’s might as an energy power is now based largely on the ongoing development of just seven oil sands projects, most of them on the ultimate scale of 300,000 to 400,000 barrels of oil a day. Add three or four projects from Alberta on that scale to produce another 1.2 million barrels of oil per day and Europe’s entire oil dependence on Russia can be eradicated. A democratic peace-promoting country would have come to Europe’s rescue, providing not just oil but the steel needed in Europe’s spine.

....With oil now at $100 per barrel and production costs about $10 a barrel and expected to fall further, the profitability of oil sands is immense. No subsidies can be justified, economic or environmental.....Clean coal has the same emissions profile as natural gas, and it is getting cleaner still.
Oil sands are following the same route to rehabilitation. They still consume too much water, but less than half as much as before.

...Alberta’s oil sands represent one of the planet’s largest reservoirs of energy — some 2.5 trillion barrels of crude bitumen from which 300 billion barrels are estimated to be available, an amount that rivals the reserves of Saudi Arabia. They need to be developed properly: cleanly, to protect the environment, and quickly, to promote peace and stability. _NationalPost

Only political fools would shut down oil sands, shale oil, and clean coal on the basis of "climate change" or other delusions. But political fools abound in both Canada and the US. It is long past time for the people to wake up the corrupt politicians in provincial, state, and national government who have been hanging the populace out to dry for so many years.

In the US, Pelosi, Boxer, Salazar, Reid, etc. etc. need to be hoisted on their own petards, dunked in hot tar, coated in feathers, and run out of town on a rail. Canada could perform similar actions on its own corrupt politicos who want to starve the country of energy and energy income.

Political peak oil is alive and well in North America. But the time may be approaching when it will become necessary to kill it off--at least for a few election cycles.