Issues
Increasing Temperature and Acidity
The oceans function as a highly effective "carbon sink" because CO2 reacts with water and because the oceans are so large. They have absorbed about one third of human-generated CO2 emissions, and also 93 per cent of the heat generated by global warming. This has helped slow down the warming of the atmosphere, but at the cost of making the oceans warmer and more corrosive. Learn more.
Tar Sands Pipeline and Tanker Traffic
Enbridge Inc. is proposing to build a twinned pipeline from near Edmonton to Kitimat, B.C. The pipeline would bring oil from the tar sands to supertankers destined for Asia and the US. At the same time, the second pipeline would bring condensate to Alberta, for thinning the bitumen so that it can be transported through pipes. More than 200 tankers a year—two to three per week—would weave a hazardous path through an obstacle course of narrow, reef-studded channels and inlets of B.C.’s Great Bear Rainforest and the rich waters of Hecate and Dixon Straits. Learn more.
Off-shore Oil and Gas
The three month-long oil eruption disaster in the Gulf of Mexico starting in April 2010 was a chilling preview of what could very easily happen to B.C.'s coast if the government does not maintain a moratorium on off-shore oil and gas development. Learn more.
Salmon Farms
Parasitic sea-lice incubated in huge salmon feedlot operations in the ocean near salmon rivers are proving to be a disaster for wild salmon. Wild salmon champion Alexandra Morton has crunched the numbers, bagged the evidence, written papers and petitioned the courts. Yet government denial continues. Learn more.
Overfishing
As we fish our way down the food chain, we are depleting the ocean's lifeblood. Many of our marine resources have been hugely overexploited, leading to diminished economic opportunities for coastal communities. Learn more.
