Big Oil baffles me. They are running full-scale ad campaigns touting their work in developing alternative energy sources, (you couldn’t miss them if you watched the Winter Olympics) and then they turn around and file a suit against the EPA for the expanded Renewable Fuels Standard. They claim it is “unlawful and unfair.”

Well, today, according to an article in E&E, Canada is leading the charge to create a consortium of oil groups, to be called the Heavy Oil Working Group, as a way to discuss how to reduce the carbon emission of fossil fuels, especially oil from tar sands. The group is meant for both heavy producers of oil and heavy consumers of oil and it is hoped that environmental groups will also join the discussion.

The talks will commence when the nations gather in Washington for the Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas, an institute suggested by President Obama last April.  It will be at this event that Canada is asking to add the Heavy Oil Working Group to the roster for discussion. They are hoping that the U.S., Mexico, Brazil, Columbia and Venezuela all join as they all have “unconventional” reserves to tap.  For example, North Dakota is mining oil from tar sands and we will be seeing a dramatic increase in offshore drilling since President Obama approved the action last week.

“The world will continue to depend on fossil based fuels for the next few decades, so our biggest challenge in many ways is to make fossil fuels cleaner,” said Marc LePage the Canadian Embassy’s minister for energy and climate change.

Yes, LePage is right, we do need to make fossil fuels cleaner. Big Oil also needs to quit double talking and choose sides – either you are or you aren’t for energy diversity (I vote for you aren’t) and cleaner fuels. In the current energy, environmental and economic situation our country finds itself in, the only way out is to work together, but it appears that what we’re doing now is working apart.