A crew of 400 might do this entire operation unless it is constructed in phases that will all link together at some time. Only so many can operate the excavators and also operate the pipe installation hoists and do the back fill and tamping. The outside supplies will be pipe sections. joints and welding and relining materials.
And this shows what you don't know. 400 people trying to put in this pipeline would be at it for years if not decades. Yes only so many people can run excavators, bulldozers, and side booms but there are surveyors, welders, masses of labourers and others, not just heavy equipment operators.
As for potential of a leak, I guess time will tell............
What do Canadians know about tar sands pipelines that most of us south of the border don't understand?
the average Canadian doesn't know any more than the average American but that isn't saying much. The population of both countries is so cowed by the horror stories being spread by "eco-crusaders" that they have no interest in knowing what the real pros and cons are.
The heavy tarry substance extracted from tar sands is not oil.
OK you may have passed the Al Gore and David Suzuki eco-scare course but you fail organic chemistry.
It has to be diluted with solvents to get it to flow.
Like steam.
One of those solvents is carcinogenic benzene. The exact mixture of solvents is a proprietary company secret, but experience shows that it's very toxic.
Uh huh... its proprietary but you know it has benzene... congratulations! So do a lot of organic chemical compounds that have more than 6 carbon atoms per molecule. How much benzene does your average tank of gas have? Sure the stuff isn't good for you but it can be handled safely and much more commonly than half informed people realize.
Experience also shows that when the diluted bitumen - dilbit - spills, the solvents evaporate and the heavy oil sticks to sediments and sinks to the bottom of rivers, lakes and ponds. It's hell to clean up.
You mean like the oil spilled from the Exxon Valdez or from BP's blowout in the Gulf of Mexico?
And yes, an oil spill in your back yard is a bad thing. So is a chemical tanker tipping or train full of chemicals derailing. Many companies, over the years, have been guilty of not doing enough to prevent leaks, on BOTH sides of the border, and some of those lackadaisical efforts have had lethal consequences. However, they are NOT common place occurrences and the technology to prevent those leaks is improving all the time, so the rarity of them increases. We can dwell on horror stories from all kinds of disasters, but the real issue is once they occur, how did we learn from them?
