DILBIT featuring Oily the Splot

 Yes it's a mashup rip from Dilbert.
You remember Oily the Splot, right? Korncob Kory Teneycke's little critter.
Oh crap. Reuters reports "a discharge of 700 barrels of crude oil from a 16-inch pipeline due to unknown reasons in Harris county, Texas" two days ago. 
How come we're getting this news from Bangalore?
Ok, one more ...

Ok, they get better :  MORE RECENT DILBITS
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Steve frets about foreign influence on Enbridge pipeline

G&M : 'Foreign money' could gum up pipeline approval, Harper warns

"Stephen Harper is warning about the possibility that hearings into Enbridge's Northern Gateway pipeline will be "hijacked" by foreign interests. The Prime Minister is threatening to prevent foreign environmental interests from delaying the approval of a pipeline that would take bitumen from the Alberta oil sands to the West Coast for shipment to Asian markets."

Ok then, let's have a look at some of those 'foreign interests' which have applied for intervenor status at the Enbridge hearings due to start in two days, courtesy of the National Energy Board's  Regulatory Document Index:

Enbridge Northern Gateway Project Joint Review Process 

Registration for Intervenor Status

• DAEWOOD INTERNATIONAL AMERICA CORP,  Anaheim, California 

• BP CANADA, subsidiary of BP (formerly British Petroleum) of Gulf Oil disaster fame

• TOTAL E&P, a wholly-owned subsidiary of TOTAL SA, France 

• EXXON MOBIL OIL,  Fairfax, Virginia 

• FLINT HILLS RESOURCES LTD, a Koch Industries subsidiary   

• SINOCANADA PETROLEUM, Sinopec, China

Bloomberg, Jan 4, 2012: 

"Ten companies have contributed $10 million each to help Enbridge finance the regulatory approval process, Enbridge spokesman Paul Stanway said in October.  

China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. also known as Sinopec, was previously the only company that had publicly stated its participation."

G&M : Oil giants back Gateway pipe :

"Gateway’s financial backers include Chinese state-owned energy company Sinopec. Market sources have said they believe China National Petroleum Corp. also holds an interest in Gateway. Sinochem Group, another Chinese energy firm, is also believed to support Gateway."

According to StatsCan in October last year, much of our tarsands is already "hijacked by foreign interests".

StatsCan : Total assets, operating revenues and operating profits under foreign control

Oil and gas extraction and support activities - 2009 

• Assets - 35.9% under foreign control
• Operating revenues - 51.1% under foreign control 
• Operating profits : 41.3% under foreign control

"American-controlled enterprises continued to dominate the shares of assets, revenues and profits under foreign-control. These enterprises increased their share of both revenues and profits to 59.1% and 58.3% respectively." 

"In the oil and gas extraction industry, foreign-controlled enterprises increased their share of revenues to 51.1%. This occurred as revenues declined nearly twice as fast in 2009 for domestic enterprises as they did for foreign enterprises."

I thought this was kinda cute from Ethical Oil's Kathryn Marshall though :

Canadians have much at stake in the construction of the pipeline and “must take a stand against foreigners and their lobbying groups interfering in our decision.”

Okey dokey then. Really looking forward to her defence of China as a foreign 'ethical oil' majority financial backer of the pipeline.

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Updates via Dave : There's nothing ethical about it :

• The Real Story : Unethical oil and its friends and 

• Northern Insights : "Ethical Oil" - an argument that makes no sense

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