Meet The Family The Tar Sands Industry Wants To Keep Quiet

by Emily Atkin

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There is an abandoned house in Alberta, Canada, where Alain Labrecque used to live. Tucked in the farming community of Peace River, it is a place brimming with personal history, rooted to his grandfather's land where his parents and eight aunts and uncles grew up, and where Alain's own children were born. Now, Alain's property and the surrounding area are primarily home to large, black cylinders of oil.
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The oil is from Alberta's much-famed tar sands, a large area of land that contains clay, bitumen, and a good deal of sand. Inside the tanks, heavy crude from the sands is heated, until it becomes viscous enough to transport. Many of those tanks currently vent freely into the atmosphere.
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As the third-largest proven crude oil reserve in the world and the key ingredient of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, and with production value that is expected to nearly triple by 2018, the Canadian tar sands have become an unseen symbol in America. For some, that symbol represents jobs, energy security, and economic prosperity. For others, it's pollution, addiction to fossil fuels, and a threat to a livable climate. What generally is not conveyed, however, is an image of the families who live there, and who have been there long before the tar sands boom.
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You've gotta understand, I've worked for oil sands, I was a contractor … I've never been negative toward oil. Never thought this would happen.

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Though Alain once thought having the tanks on his property would be a blessing, he now describes them as a curse. After experiencing an unusual kind of sickness - fainting, weight loss, gray skin, strange growths - that he believes was caused by the tanks' unregulated emissions, Alain and his family were eventually forced to move to British Columbia. They have pegged Baytex Energy, the owner of the tanks, as their enemy. Baytex has produced studies claiming innocence, but has also offered to buy the Labrecques' land in exchange for their silence. So, taking their doctor's own advice, the family decided to move, and fight the battle for their home from afar.
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The doctor's words to them? "He said, 'You are just a small, little bolt in this huge robot, and you don't matter. Move.'"

Our energy drilling is killing some of us