Tankers is Loonie

Oil protest uses loonie, hoping that money talks
The Canadian Press

February 3, 2009

VANCOUVER -- A Victoria-based environmental group is using the Canadian dollar to spread a very graphic message.

Dogwood Initiative, which is dedicated to sustainable land reform, is distributing 200,000 decals to stick on the one-dollar coin's loon design.

The black decal would cover the loon and the horizontal lines depicting water to create an illusion that the bird and its surroundings are coated in oil.

Dogwood Initiative hopes the campaign warns Canadians about potential federal support for proposals to allow oil tankers along B.C.'s north coast, including Hecate Strait, Queen Charlotte Sound and Douglas Channel.

Calgary-based Enbridge Inc. plans to build a 1,170-kilometre pipeline to carry oil-sands oil from Edmonton to Kitimat, B.C., where it would be loaded onto tankers for transport to Asian markets.
Environmentalists say a ban on oil tanker traffic off the West Coast has been in place for more than 40 years and construction of a supertanker port in Kitimat raises the potential for a devastating oil spill.

"We're on our way to distributing about 200,000 of them," Dogwood spokesman Charles Campbell said of the decals.

The group is working with some businesses that will apply the decals to loonies that come into their stores through customers.

He cited a chocolate shop on Denman Island and some coffee outlets in Ottawa as examples of businesses that would participate.

Dogwood has already received a call from the Royal Canadian Mint in Ottawa, he said.

"They're not very fond of what we're doing," Mr. Campbell said. "They said we were in breach of the Currency Act. The issue doesn't seem to be defacing. It seems to be using currency for purposes other than legal tender."

The decal sticks to the coin by "static cling" and can be removed without damaging the coin, Mr. Campbell said.

"We think we're on the right side of the law regarding defacing coins because it doesn't do any damage to the coins."

The goal of the campaign is legislation in support of the moratorium, he said.

"What we are asking for is a legislated tanker ban on the coast."