Tar Sands South: First US Tar Sands Mine Approved in Utah

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http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/10/27-2


Photograph by David Hasemyer/InsideClimate News

The race is on for the up-and-coming U.S. tar sands industry. To date, the tar sands industry is most well-known for the havoc it continues to wreak in Alberta, Canada - but its neighbor and fellow petrostate to the south may soon join in on the fun.

On Oct. 24, the Utah Water Quality Board (UWQB) approved the first ever tar sands mine on U.S. soil, handing a permit to U.S. Oil Sands, a company whose headquarters are based in Alberta, despite it's name.

In a 9-2 vote, the UWQB gave U.S. Oil Sands the green light to begin extracting bitumen from its PR Spring Oil Sands Project, located in the Uinta Basin in eastern Utah. The UWQB concluded that there's no risk of groundwater pollution from tar sands extraction for the prospective mining project.

Members of the public were allowed to attend the hearing but "were not permitted to provide input," according to The Salt Lake Tribune.

[NickB79]

1. Where are they getting the water for this project?

The Southwestern US is projected to get progressively drier as climate change ramps up, and tar sands require massive inputs of water to operate. The Canadian projects are already diverting entire rivers and creating holding ponds large enough to see from space. How are the developers of these sands planning on duplicating this in the much drier environment of Utah, where water rights are rigidly protected?