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The Carbon Dioxide  Information Analysis Center lists 207 nations by order of carbon emissions. The Tar Sands has higher emissions than 145 of them.

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Few Canadians know that Canada is home to one of the world’s largest dams and it is built to hold toxic waste from just one Tar Sands operation.

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The pollution pouring into the Athabasca River is already being found far downstream in the enormous Peace- Athabasca Delta.17 This delta is one of the largest freshwater deltas in the world, a region of incredible biodiversity. Lake Athabasca then flows north to Canada’s largest lakes and on into Canada’s longest river, the MacKenzie, ultimately flowing into the Mackenzie Delta and Arctic Ocean. More than 1/6 of Canada drains into this water- shed, which is home to many human communities as well as being one of the most important areas anywhere in the world for migratory birds and animal habitat.

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• Mercur y levels (total mercury in sediments) are as much as 98% higher in parts of the Athabasca delta over the historical medians.
• Dissolved arsenic levels have jumped as much as 466%.
• Sediment arsenic levels have increased as much as 114%.
• Alkylated PAH levels in sediments have risen as much as 72% above the historical means in some areas.24

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Suncor admitted in 1997 that its Tar Island Pond leaks approximately 1,600 cubic metres of toxic fluid into the Athabasca River every day.26 The tailings ponds are growing constantly and already cover more than 50 square kilometres.27

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Fish and game animals are being found covered with tumours and mutations. Some First Nations describe how fish frying in a pan smell like burning plastic. One study by a Tar Sands company concluded that arsenic could be as much as 453 times the acceptable levels in moose meat from the region.7 The Alberta government responded with an assessment that arsenic levels are “only” 17 to 33 times the acceptable levels.8 Both reports’ estimates were well beyond the “acceptable” rate of additional cancers of 1 per 100,000 people.

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And it is just beginning. Approvals have already been given that will double the size of existing operations, and our leaders have been talking with the US government to grow the Tar Sands five-fold in a “short time span.”2 The Tar Sands are now the biggest capital project anywhere on Earth and the biggest energy undertaking anywhere. Already, Canada is the largest foreign supplier of US oil.

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“it is just a moonscape. It is wrong in my judgement, a major wrong...
So it is a major, major federal and provincial issue.”
— THE HONOURABLE PETER LOUGHEED, former Premier of Alberta

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