The Alberta tar sands are Canada’s Mordor. Like the fictional barren land, home to the evil Sauron in JRR Tolkien’s Middle Earth, the tar sands are vast, destructive and represent the real-life death of nature. The air is foul; water is being poisoned and drained. Large tracts of forest and wetlands are being torn from the earth, and in the gaping holes where life once thrived sit giant ponds of toxic waste.
Thanks to a government that has placed trade and foreign investment above environmental and social needs, Alberta has become one of the last playgrounds for Big Oil. It is here that Shell, Total and Exxon have made their home
