Recipe for Disaster

A quote caught my eye the other day "I had rather be an oyster than a man, the most stupid and senseless of animals."-George Berkeley I thought to myself what a stupid quote oysters can’t invent an I-Phone or a Atomic bomb or how about an incredible engineering wonder such as a SUPERTANKER, like I said stupid quote. 

Then it occurred to me that it wasn’t oysters that are responsible for the decimation of not only themselves but 10 million scallops and any other creature that has a shell on our BC coast, it was mans activities that have acidified the oceans. Ph levels on BCs coast have dropped from the normal 8.2 Ph to 7.2 Ph which is significantly more acidic and is caused by man made carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide being absorbed by the ocean. I guess there are many different opinions on whether I-Phones or Atomic bombs are good or bad but 1000 supertankers being invited to inundate BC shores is definitely one of the dumbest short-sighted, dangerous ideas ever. 

We all know what a weed whacker is, you know those loud irritating garden tools that wakes you up in 6.00 A.M. well they are not only loud but they used to be 2 stoke motors but because they were so polluting they have had to become 4 stroke engines, well guess what supertankers have 2 stroke motors 14 cylinders and 3ft 2in pistons and an 8ft 2in stroke and produce 260 times more sulphur dioxide than all the cars in the world, just one supertanker produces as much as 5000 tons of sulphur a year and 16 supertankers create as much air pollution as all the cars in the worlds. 

Being a two stroke engine is only part of the problem as your normal 2 stroke weed whacker burns refined gasoline with a little refined oil, a super tanker burns bunker oil which is the sludge that is left over from the oil refining process and has up to 4500 times more sulphur than is allowed in car fuel and these behemoths burn 16 tons an hour or 380 tons a day. 

This is without a doubt a clear and imminent danger to the citizens of BC, our wild life, the environment and the very province we live in, Mayor Robertson has even more to fear from these pipelines, supertankers and coal-ports than he even knows. 

I know oysters did not have a hand in their own destruction along with eventually most of the life in the sea and yes the world if we continue on this fools path, but once again we ignore the obvious and the science and invite around 1000 supertankers to our BC shores. A super tankers motor weighs in at 2000 tons so in our infinite wisdom we have allowed 1000, 2000 ton extraordinarily dirty weed whackers into our back yards so don’t be surprised if there is an epidemic of allergies and asthma, cancer and a pandora’s box of other health problems. 

Maybe that isn’t such a stupid quote after all.