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Thinking of our future

I am an opponent and I am thinking about the future for my children and theirs. A future where there is abundant clean water to drink

Re: Star letter, "Opponents need to think about future."

I am an opponent and I am thinking about the future for my children and theirs. A future where there is abundant clean water to drink and clean air to breathe.

These are the first things we lose when big oil and gas are allowed to run away with development for the sake of profit.

If Canada becomes an energy supper power will I personally benefit in any way? Will the auto fuel price and home heating cost go down? No, we will be forced to pay world prices for our own oil and gas.

Gertie Pool wrote about the development of the Trans Canada Highway and the Canadian Pacific Railway. These great projects were completed because they served all the people of Canada, not just a few that will enjoy enormous profits at a cost to all of us in one way or another.

About a stable oil supply, well it seems we have a surplus to a point that we have to export it to other countries at a huge risk to British Columbia. I've got an idea. Why not sell the gas to Canadians; it's ours in the first place. Because there's not enough profit in that.

The Exon Valdez spill in Alaska is still not cleaned up and never will be.

Coastal spills are impossible to clean up and the compensation is yet to be fully paid to the fishing communities that lost so much. That will happen on our coast and just imagine getting to, stopping and cleaning up a spill in the mountainous wilderness of the interior of B.C.

I keep hearing about the thousands of jobs that a pipeline will create. Probably about a couple thousand while the line is being built. The full time operating crew? I would think about five hundred or less in this age of computers and automation.

What about the conveniences that flow from the oil we export that we enjoy every day?

The imported plastic junk we buy that end up in our land fill in a few weeks.

The low cost clothing produces in sweat shops, produced sometimes by children.

I don't call this a benefit to anyone.

This a time when all the world should be developing clean natural resources, tidal and wind generation, underground thermal farms, clean fission and bio fuels.

If we keep pumping oil the day will come when the oil runs out and there is not enough time then to develop these new energy sources. What then? Think about the future.

If I had the funds I would like to launch a frivolous law suit against the Northern Gateway project for theft of everything I hold dear in my province.

John Winter, Langley