Time Line

TIME LINE – KOCHS
Additions are made as research continues.  If you note inaccuracies, please contact us. 
 Sources: Koch Industries Website, Wikipedia,articles now being added, and other. 


1867 - October, 22 - Hotze 'Harry' Koch, second child of a physician, Johan Anthon Koch (1836-1910), and his wife, Gatske Hotzes Jorritsma (1837-1876), is born in the sea-side town of Workum, Holland. His family was well-to-do, owning farmland and operating a linseed oil refinery and a shipping business between Amsterdam and Workum, which used sailboats for transport. 
 
His mother, Gatska, died when he was a child. Displaced by his father's marriage to a much younger woman, the daughter of a banker and the seven children then born of the marriage, he was dissatisfied at home. After apprenticing to a newspaper publisher in Holland for a while he decided to immigrate to America, drawn by the railroad boom of the late 1800s.
Railroads were the Big Oil of their time, following a business model still in use by the Kochs today. 
 
1888 – December 5 - Harry Koch lands in New York. Harry will work on various papers, improving his writing skills and his English. He first working for Dutch language papers in Chicago and Grand Rapids, MI.

1891 - Harry purchases the Quanah Chief, having relocated to Quanah, Texas from Austin.
1894 – Harry acquired the Quanah Tribune, consolidating the two papers under the name Tribune-Chief in 1897. 
 
1898 – February 11 - Harry married Miss Margaret Mixon in Mclennan, TX.

November 10 – John Anton Koch born to Harry and Margaret M. Mixon Koch in Quanah, Texas.

1900 – September 23 - Frederick Chase Koch born to Harry and Margaret M. Mixon Koch in Quanah, Texas.

1907 - October 17 - Mary Clementine Robinson was the daughter of a Kansas City, Mo., surgeon who also served as a professor at the University of Kansas School of Medicine. An English and French major, Mrs. Koch graduated in 1929 from Wellesley College in Massachusetts. She also studied at the Kansas City Art Institute. Known to express her love of the arts through drawing and painting, Mrs. Koch was also an accomplished silversmith.

1917 – Frederick Chase Koch starts college at Rice University, in Houston, Texas.

1919 – Frederick Chase Koch transfers to MIT from Rice University.

1922 – Fred Koch graduates MIT.

First employed by the Texas Company in Port Arthur, Texas, and then by the Medway Oil and Storage Company in Kent, England, where he was chief engineer.

1925 – Joins an MIT classmate, P. C. Keith, Keith-Winkler Engineering, a petrochemical engineering concern in Wichita, Kansas. Soon, Keith moves on. Firm is renamed the Winkler-Koch Engineering Company.

1926 - TAR SANDS - a patent was filed by Karl Clark at the University of Alberta for a hot water thermal extraction process which could separate oil from the surface tar and this basic extraction process is still used today.

1927 – Fred Koch invents an improved thermal cracking process for converting heavy oil into gasoline. Cracking was first invented by a Russian engineer, Vladimir Shukhov, in the late 19th century.
A consortium of larger oil companies sued Koch for patent infringement and blocked him from selling his process in the United States.
Koch’s new royalty-free thermal cracking process, by producing higher yields of refined gasoline from crude oil and reducing down time, helped smaller companies to better compete with their larger, more entrenched, and better-capitalized rivals. The latter lost no time in attacking Koch, filing no less than 44 lawsuits against Winkler-Koch and all its customers in a contemptible campaign to force the company out of business. That Winkler-Koch won every lawsuit but one (and that verdict was later overturned when it was discovered that the judge had been bribed) is evidence enough that the full-frontal legal assault on the upstart Koch was inspired by no higher motives than envy and greed. We must suppose that, as a result of the campaign to sue him out of the refining business, Fred Koch must have begun to understand that the modern American business sector was not nearly as free-market as it was cracked up to be.

1929 to 1932 - Koch built 15 cracking units in the Soviet Union, and many others elsewhere in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. He also brought Soviet technicians to the United States for training — some of whom opted not to return to their Stalinist motherland.

He then turned to the Soviet Union, where he helped Joseph Stalin build 15 refineries. David Koch has said that his father had no idea who the Bolsheviks were when they arrived at his west Texas office asking for his help.

1932 - October 22 - Marriage of Mary Clementine Robinson to Frederick Chase Koch, in Missouri.

1933 - August 26 – First son born, Frederick Robinson Koch

1935 - November 1 – Second Son born, Charles de Ganahl Koch

1940 - May 3 - Third son born, David Hamilton Koch

May 3 – Fourth son born, William Ingraham "Bill" Koch
Koch served as its president until 1941, when he established his own firm, the Koch Engineering Company. He served as its president from 1943 to 1959.


Koch co-founded Wood River Oil and Refining Company, an oil refiner, located in East Saint Louis, Illinois, and served as its president.

1941 – Fred C. Koch acquires Spring Creek Ranch in Kansas Flint Hills.

1943 - Koch founded the Koch Oil Corporation, which he served as its president from 1944 to 1959.

1945 – Koch Engineering Company is formed.

1946 - Koch acquired the Rock Island Oil and Refining Company in Oklahoma.

1951 – Beaverhead Ranch in Montana, just West of Yellowstone Park, is acquired

TAR SANDS -Ned Gilbert, a young geologist and landman at Sun Oil Co in Calgary recommended that Tar Sands be leasedi over the objections of George Dunlop, the Sunoco manager in Calgary. Gilbert appealed to J. Howard Pew, who had been the chairman of Sun oil Co since 1912. Pew told his board that if they wouldn’t lease the acreage he would personally acquire it.

1952 - Fred Koch won the last of the dozens of lawsuits the oil industry filed over his thermal cracking process and secured a $1.5 million settlement. He went on to build a modest fortune around pipelines and refineries named Wood River until the name is changed to Rock Island Oil and Refining Company in 1959.

Introduction of FLEXITRAY valve trays.

  Acquisition of historic Matador Ranch in West Texas

1955 - Pine Bend built by the Great Northern Oil Company with a capacity of 25,000 barrels per day.[3] Koch Industries purchased a controlling interest in the plant in 1969
James Howard Marshall II (January 24, 1905 – August 4, 1995)
Marshall turned his investment in Great Northern Oil Co. with Fred Koch during the 1950s into a 16% stake in Koch Industries, now the nation's second largest privately held company.[7] When his eldest son J. Howard Marshall III sided with Bill Koch, Fredrick Koch and other collateral family members in a failed attempt to take over Koch Industries from Charles Koch and David Koch, he purchased back company stock given previously as a gift and removed the eldest son from his estate plan. Conversely, during the same dispute, the late E. Pierce Marshall sided with his father, Charles Koch and David Koch.

1956 – June 22 John Anton Koch dies in, Quanah, Hardeman County Texas, USA

1958 - Fred Koch helped found the John Birch Society


1959 – Fred C. Koch acquires a one/third interest in Great Northern Oil Company which owns Pine Bend Refinery in Minnesota.
Wood River's name is changed to Rock Island Oil and Refining Company
1960 - After some of Fred Koch's Russian associates died at the hands of Stalin, Koch became a lifelong opponent of communism. In 1960 he self-published a 40-page booklet titled A Businessman Looks at Communism that he sold for 25 cents a copy.
His four sons were all raised by this point in time. 
 
1961 – Charles G. Koch joins what is then Koch Engineering and Rock Island Oil and Refining Company.

1966 – Charles G. Koch becomes president of Rock Island Oil and Refining Company. 
 
1967 – Fred Koch dies. Charles Koch, then 32 years old, became chairman and CEO. The company's annual revenues at the time were $177 million, less than two one- thousandths of what they are today.

TAR SANDS – Sun Oil - The world’s first Tar Sands plant was completed at an estimated cost of $250 million. That year, J. Howard Pew opened the Great Canadian Oil Sands plant concluding, “If the North American continent is to produce the oil to meet its requirements in the years ahead, oil from the Athabasca area must of necessity play an important role.”
1968 - Rock Island Oil and Refining Company is are renamed renamed iKoch Industries in honor of Frederick Chase Koch. 
 
1969 - Charles Koch secured a controlling interest in Great Northern Oil Company.
Koch Industries purchased controlling interest of the refinery in 1969 and renamed the facility Koch Refining Company. At the time, the refinery was one of a few which had been built on the most up-to-date principles of integration in order to assure maximum efficiency in sequence of operations. During the early ‘90s, Koch significantly expanded the refinery by adding process equipment. This resulted in an expansion of the overall refinery layout. This expansion was primarily driven by the need for desulfurized diesel fuel for trucks. 
 
1970 – David H. Koch joins Koch Engineering as Technical Service Manager 
 
1973 – TAR SANDS - Over ¾ of all Canadian oil and gas production was foreign owned (primarily US) or seven sister’ companies and all but 10% of Canadian petroleum companies were controlled by foreigners. Then as the price of oil fluctuated, the commerciality became uncertain many companies sold or reduced their interests and the Tar Sands were renamed oil sands to attract investors. 
 
1976 – Koch Carbon if formed to market petroleum coke. 
 
1978 – David H. Koch becomes president of Koch Engineering. 
 
1979 – Witchita entrepeneur George Ablah partners with Koch Industries to form ABKO, which purchases Chrysler Realty for $195 million. Of the more than 700 properties purchased in the deal 480 are sold back to Chrysler in 1982.

September 4th – The Libertarian National Convention begins at the Bonaventure Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles. David Koch is running for the nomination as candidate for Vice President so the Koch Machine can take over the Libertarian Party.
The group doing the on-the-ground work is headed by Edward H. Crane,III and his Flunkies, Lickspittles, and Brown-nosers. In accordance with their common practices the Kochs are willing to invest money in creating a centralized organization which places them in firm control. Think of this as a first attempt, which eventually succeeded with the Tea Parties. 
 
1980 – Koch Chemical Technology Group is formed. Wood River crude pipeline construction begins. 
 
September – Alternative '80 – This is the telethon, qua fundraiser, which took place from multiple locations across the country instead of having a real campaign for the Libertarian nominee, Ed Clark and David H. Koch. Bright Moment: Hearing Charles Koch ask Ed Crane, in horrified tones, how a fundraiser ended up in the red to the tune of $250,000. That was a lot of money for Libertarians, but not, evidently for Ed Crane. It was just dumb luck. I stepped into the elevator just as the conversation was beginning. 
 
1981 - Koch Industries acquires a refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas from Sun Oil.
The Kochs lose control of the Libertarian Party when Alicia Clark is elected National Chairman at the National Convention in Denver, Colorado. They do not take this well. 
 
1982 – Koch Industries acquires a second refinery.

1983 - Libertarian National Convention – New York NY - The Kochs lose again when David Bergland, the Libertarian Beach Boy, wins the nomination over Ed Ravenal at the National Convention. Nominees: David Bergland, John Lewis
The Crane Machine walks out in mass to begin scheming to destroy the Libertarian party. 
 
1985 – Koch Industries acquires a third refinery.

1988 – Construction of Wisconsin pipeline to provide outlet for increased Pine Bend Refinery output.

Construction begins on the Texas pipeline, running from Corpus Christi to Dallas/Ft. Worth. Most of the jet fuel used at DFW is transported through this pipeline. 
 
1989 – Koch Nitrogen Company if formed to enter the nitrogen fertilizer business. 
 
LEGAL – May - The Senate held hearings on what the Senate special committee on investigations called "a widespread scheme to steal oil on Indian land." According to data the committee compiled, Koch took 1.95 million barrels of oil it didn’t pay for from 1986 to 1988.
The Senate referred the case to the Justice Department, but no indictment followed. In December 1999 in a civil trial, the jury found that "Koch Industries had made 24,587 false claims in buying oil, underpaying the U.S. government for royalties on Native American land from 1985 to 1989." Koch settled the case in 2001 for $25 million.
Koch's current PR line on the scandal? Melissa Cohlmia, Koch’s director of corporate communications, said in an email to Bloomberg reporters, "We believe that our practices were consistent with industry practice."[10]


1990 – Brown Flintube Company is acquired by Koch Chemical Technology Group
December 21 – Mary Robinson Koch dies in Witchita. 
 
199s – LEGAL - Faults in Koch Industry pipelines were responsible for more than 300 oil and chemical spills in five states, prompting a landmark penalty of $35 million from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). In Minnesota, it was fined an additional $8 million for discharging oil into streams.

According to an August 30, 2010 article in The New Yorker magazine, "In 1999, a jury found Koch Industries guilty of negligence and malice in the deaths of two Texas teen-agers in an explosion that resulted from a leaky underground butane pipeline. (In 2001, the company paid an undisclosed settlement.)

During the months leading up to the 2000 presidential elections, the company faced even more liability, in the form of a 97-count federal indictment charging it with concealing illegal releases of 91 metric tons of benzene, a known carcinogen, from its refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas. The company faced liability for three hundred and fifty million dollars in fines, and four Koch employees faced up to thirty-five years in prison. [75]

1992 – Acquisition of $100 portfolio from Chrysler puts Koch in the municipal finance business. By the end of the decade Koch Financial Corp, has $1 Billion in assets.
The Howie Rich - Crane - Koch Machine is launched.

1993 – Publication of first Market-Based Management book. 
 
1995 – Koch Indusrries establishes a venture capital group which invests $150 million in start-ups. 
 
1996 – LEGAL - Aug. 24 – Koch Industries incinerates two teenagers. Danielle Dawn Smalley Koch Industries was hit by the largest judgment for personal liability in history over the incineration of Danielle Smalley and a friend on Aug. 24, 1996. The cause was a defective high-pressure gas pipeline that exploded, taking the lives of the two teenagers. Both were 17.

1997 – Koch Engineering Compnay, Inc., and its affiliates acquires Glitsch International, a world-wide mass transfer equipment company. 
 
Steve Kromer, then president of Koch Exploration, told Canada NewsWire that "Koch is committed to the Canadian heavy oil industry… As the demand for heavy crude continues to grow at Koch's Minnesota refinery, we intend to meet that demand with heavy crude from Canada."

1998 – KoSa, in which Koch Industries has a 50 pecent interest, is formed to acquire Hoechst's polyester division. 
 
2000 – FertiNitro completes construction of the world's largest fertilizer complex in Venezuela. A Koch Nitrogen affiliate is a share holder in FertiNitro. 

2001 - Moody's Investors Services gave the Koch subsidiary that owns Pine Bend an A1 rating, citing the group's "strong capitalization and strategic importance to Koch Industries" and its refinery that can "process low-grade crude into higher value products."

LEGAL – April - The Koch Petroluem Group (now Flint Hills Resources) "pleaded guilty to a felony charge of lying to the government about its benzene emissions". A report to the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission disclosed only 1/149th of the actual benzene pollution. The company was fined $10 million and ordered to fund an additional $10 million in costs for environmental cleanup in South Texas.

The extremely profitable plant earned almost $200 million for the company in 1995, the year of the violation; the benzene emissions would have cost $7 million to control. After an environmental technician reported the false report that led to the fines, Koch Petroleum Group moved the whistle blower to an empty office with no tasks and no e-mail access. She quit a short time later.[9]

LEGAL - After George W. Bush became president the U.S. Justice Department dropped 88 of the charges. Two days before the trial, John Ashcroft settled for a plea bargain, in which the company pled guilty to falsifying documents. All major charges were dropped, and Koch and Ashcroft settled the lawsuit for a fraction of that amount.

David Uhlmann, a career prosecutor who, at the time, headed the environmental-crimes section at the Justice Department, described the suit as “one of the most significant cases ever brought under the Clean Air Act.”[75]

2002 – Beaverhead Ranch in Montana becomes the first ranch in the US to earn Wildlife Habitate Council certification. 
 
2003 – Flint Ridge Resources enters lubricant base oil business. Koch nitrogen production business interests increase domestically and in Trinidad and Tobago. 
 
LEGAL - Bloomberg also found that Koch companies had traded and worked extensively with Iran over a ten year period. Notable Koch-Iranian collaborations include the construction of the world's largest methanol plant for the National Iranian Petrochemical Company at the city of Bandar Assaluyeh. The plant is being used to tap into Iran's extensive natural gas resources.

A purchase order for refining equipment at the plant was sent the day after President George W. Bush outlined the concept of an "axis of evil" in his 2003 State of the Union address, where he articulated his view that Iran was a direct threat to the United States and specifically advocated for economic sanctions that Koch companies may have been violating. “Every single chance they had to do business with Iran, or anyone else, they did,” said one whistle blower of Koch Chemicals' dealings with Iran.[8]

2004 – Flint Ridge Resources purchases Alaskan assets, including a crude oil refinery at the North Pole and terminals in Fairbanks and Anchorage. Koch Industries acquires INVISTA, formerly DuPont Textiles and Interiors and merge it with KoSa.
 
2005 – Koch Industries acquires Georgia-Pacific for $22 Billion, including the consumption of debt. 
  
2006 – Forbes Magazine names Koch Industries the largest private company in the world.
Study Confirms Tea Party Was Created by Big Tobacco and Billionaires
Although he is now retired the guy who once headed the 'dirty tricks' political division of Koch Industries was named Dick Fink. 
 
Howie Rich, the Capo for Ed Crane, oversaw operations for Koch-funded ooperations. Hart Williams, a journalist in Oregon, wrote about their antics. 
 
Prologue: A Ball of Snakes
Hart and I became acquainted when he found an article I had written about the Kochs at this time. 
 
LOBBYING -The company spent $3,528,750 on lobbying. $820,000 was to outside lobbying firms with the remainder spent on in-house lobbyists.[74]

In February 2005, the Hill reported, "Top White House official Matt Schlapp is joining the Washington office of oil-and-gas conglomerate Koch Industries, the latest example of high-level administration and congressional staffers making post-election leaps to the lobbying world." Schlapp had headed the White House’s Office of Political Affairs. At Koch, Schlapp will be the executive director of federal affairs, directing Washington lobbying. [10]
Elizabeth Stolpe, previously in-house lobbyist for Koch Industries, became Associate Director For Toxics & Environmental Protection at the White House Council on Environmental Quality.

2007 – Publication of the Science of Sucess: How Market-Based Management Built the World's Largest Private Company, by Koch Industries Inc., Chairman and CEO, Charles G. Koch. 
 
2008 – The MinnCan Project, a 304 mile expansion of the Minnesota Pipeline System was completed; it will deliver crude oil tore fineries in the Twin Cities.
 
LEGAL - an internal investigation found numerous instances of bribery to foreign officials to secure contracts by Koch Industries subsidiary Koch-Glitsch. One incident which came under investigation was the payment of an unusually high premium to a sales agent who admitted in a French court that the payment had been passed on to someone representing a partially state-owned Egyptian company in order to secure a contract there.
The company attempted to blame the sales agent and terminated him with a six page letter detailing the company's illicit payments to interests in Algeria, Egypt, India, Morocco, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia and placing blame for them on the sales agent. However, the court found that "[the sales agent] was not giving authorizations" for the payments, instead indicating that Charles Ender, a major Koch executive and president of Koch-Glitsch for Europe and Asian operations at the time, was responsible.[6]

2009 – INVISTA'S STAINMASTER and ANTRON Carpet fibers become the first to be certified as Environmentally Preferred Products. 
 
2010 – Flint Ridge Resources acquires the first two of four Iowa ethanol plants.
Matador Ranch aqarded two of Texas's highest environmental stewardship honors.
POLITICAL – September - Koch subsidiary donates $1 million to stop Calif. GHG law.
A company controlled by the Koch brothers donated $1 million to the campaign to pass Proposition 23, the Suspend AB 32 California ballot initiative that would halt the state's global warming law. The contribution came from Flint Hills Resources, a Kansas petrochemical company that is a subsidiary of Koch Industries. The Koch donation came a day after Tesoro, a Texas oil company that has been bankrolling the pro-Prop 23 campaign, put $1 million into the campaign coffers. According to the No Prop 23 campaign, 97 percent of the $8.2 million raised by the Yes forces has been given by oil-related interests and 89 percent of that money has come from out of state. Three companies, Koch Industries, Tesoro, and Valero -- another Texas-based oil company -- have provided 80 percent of those funds.[70]


2011 – INVISTA expanded its spandex venture in Foshan, China to meet the growing demand. 
 
Koch Fertilizer acquired H&J Bunn, LTD, one of UK's largest independent fertilizer distributors. 
 
POLITICAL - Feb. 23 -  New Hampshire's overwhelmingly Republican House of Representatives voted to support HB 519, a bill that would repeal participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, which has cut greenhouse gas emissions and other pollution and made improvements in energy efficiency. The bill passed by a nearly party-line vote of 246 to 104 (13 Republicans voted against, two Democrats for). The bill has to pass through the finance committee before a final house vote and consideration by the senate. Gov. John Lynch (D-NH), who has touted the success of RGGI in making the air healthier while increasing economic prosperity, is expected to veto the bill, but Republicans hold veto-proof majorities in both chambers of the New Hampshire legislature. The bill was aided by robocalls from the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity group, which flooded the state with calls in support the bill. Rep. Sandra Keans (D-Rochester), told the Nashua Telegraph that AFP’s calls were “sleazy” and deliberately false: “I have never seen such a cowardly perpetration pulled on the citizens of New Hampshire."[67]

July - New Hampshire Gov. John Lynch vetoed the effort, stating ""I am vetoing this legislation because it will cost our citizens jobs, both now and into the future, hinder our economic recovery, and damage our state's long-term economic competitiveness." [68]

LEGAL - September 22 - business media outlet Bloomberg released an extensive report detailing the results of an investigation it had conducted into allegations by several former Koch employees turned whistle-blower. One whistle-blower detailed her termination after her compliance check had discovered a number of bribery payments made in order to secure contracts in six countries, including Nigeria, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. Reporters also discovered that Koch companies had traded with Iran through foreign-held subsidiaries, possibly violating US law. Other sources within the article detailed a culture of poor ethics and allegations of outright theft.[5]
 
POLITICAL - Spring- Article, Andrew Stern of Reuters tied the Koch brothers directly to the union-busting effort, writing that "Charles and David Koch, who both rank 24th on the Forbes list of the world's richest people with $17.5 billion each, are behind campaign donations of tens of thousands, if not millions, of dollars to Republicans leading the anti-union effort." Brian Doherty, editor of Reason Magazine (which is published by a Koch-funded think tank), wrote "this is all a wave of political belief that the Kochs unquestionably have funded in various ways for years and years," [61]

The New York Times reported that, between 1997 and 2008, David and Charles Koch collectively gave more than $17 million to groups lobbying against unions[62]; the Kochs are one of (Republican) Governor Walker's largest corporate supporters.[63]

TAR SANDS - , TransCanada requested permission to build a 1,661 mile pipeline from Canada's tar sands oil fields to U.S. refiners in Texas. The so-called Keystone XL pipeline would import as much as 510,000 barrels per day. Koch Industries is responsible for close to 25 percent of the oil tar sands crude that is imported into the United States, and are one of the biggest refiners of Alberta oil sands crude oil. [71] Some speculated that Koch Industries would benefit significantly from the project. [72]

May -  Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) formally requested more information from Republican leadership on the House Energy and Commerce Committee about how the project might benefit Koch Industries. They wrote:
Publicly available information indicates that the company is involved in several aspects of Canadian tar sands development. Koch’s Pine Bend Refinery in Minnesota currently processes roughly 25% of the tar sands fuel imports to the United States. Koch owns Flint Hills Resources, LLP, in Calgary, Canada, which is “among Canada’s largest crude oil purchasers, shippers and exporters.” Flint Hills Resources also operates a crude oil terminal in Hardisty, Alberta, where the Keystone XL pipeline will begin. According to the Government of Alberta, Koch Industries has both proposed and producing tar sands projects in the province. The Oil Sands Developers Group also indicates that Koch is a tar sands project developer. Koch’s Corpus Christi refinery is positioned near the end of the proposed Keystone XL pipeline and would be a potential buyer for the tar sands crude shipped through the pipeline.[73]
2012 – Announces the expansion of the Witchita campus, including 210,000 square-foot office building to accommodate 745 employees.
Purchases 44.4 percent interest of Guardian Industries, Corp., maker of glass, automotive, and building products. 
 
TAR SANDS - Shell and its partners Petrochina, Korea Gas Corporation and Mitsubishi Corp selected TransCanada in 2012 to build a Natural Gas and LNG export pipeline from Dawson Creek to Kitimat. This includes a Douglas Channel LNG export facility.

TAR SANDS - In 2012, the province OF Alberta ran a $3 billion budget deficit. At the same time, the Fort McMurray School Board, the birthplace of the Tar Sands boom, was confronted with cutting the school week to 4 days because they couldn’t afford to pay their school bus drivers for a full week. More than 1400 children were reliant on the Fort McMurray food band and 100 women per year are turned away from the women’s shelter in town due to a lack of beds.

2014 – February – TAR SANDS - Transcanada is moving forward with their Heartland pipeline project proposal to move 600,000 - 900,000 barrels per day of Tar Sands oil 125 miles from Fort Saskatchewan to Hardisty. Hardisty, Alberta is where the Koch Bros. have a Tar Sands refinery. Construction is expected to begin in 2015 and the 36 inch pipeline could be in service in 2015. This project was approved in February 2014 and includes a terminal facility with 1.6 million barrel storage capacity at an estimated combined cost of $900 million.

March – TAR SANDS - Enbridge East pipeline project was approved. This involves a reversal of direction and increase in capacity to 300,000 barrels per day for Enbridge Line 9 across 400 miles from Ontario to Montreal. This would nearly supply the excess capacity of the two Quebec Refineries, Valero Energy and Suncor Energy in Montreal.

March - TAR SANDS - TransCanada Corp proposed a $12 billion Energy East Pipeline to extend nearly 3000 miles from Alberta to the East Coast and would be capable of transporting over 1 million barrels of Tar Sands oil per day. This would probably be refined at the Irving Oil plant in Saint John refinery and exported at a new terminal at the port.
TAR SANDS - the final 200 mile leg of the Portland, Maine to Montreal pipeline built in World War II and now controlled by Exxon will also be reversed and expanded. These projects could be completed in 2014 at an estimated cost around $3 billion.