The Oil Drum series on Canadian oil sands

The Oil Drum has now posted the second part of its series on the Canadian oil sands (parts one, two). In my view it's overly dismissive of some of the environmental charges against oil sands, but is nevertheless highly informative and useful for anyone interested.

One chart I liked (I had been searching for a good version) was this from CERA on well-to-wheel emissions for different types of crude. Oil sands come out not much dirtier than other oil sources.

CERA is chaired by Daniel Yergin (of The Prize and of recent Peak Oil notoriety) and is a highly knowledgeable, well-respected, and middle-of-the-road energy firm, so I trust their numbers on this to be pretty robust.