Let's be realistic.

Alberta's oil will not get to "tidewater" on either of Canada's coasts, not for 10 or 20 years.

Those who believe fossil fuels are part of the climate change problem are winning the political battles in Ottawa, Quebec and British Columbia.

New or expanded pipeline proposals that need regulatory approvals will not get built. Environmental reviews, appeals, appeals of appeals - are now so time-consuming and so expensive as to make new pipeline construction near-impossible.

The only way increased production of oil - mostly heavy or diluted bitumen oil from the oilsands - can be moved is through existing pre-approved pipelines and rail lines. There's one realistic exception: New pipeline and new rail might be possible through friendly neighbouring jurisdictions.

Canada currently exports 3.7 million barrels of oil per day (bpd). The currently transport system is keeping up, barely.

Growth will still happen, slower than was predicted because of low oil prices, at an added 100,000 new barrels a day, per year, through 2030.

So how do we get the stuff out of here?

1. Pipeline-ready heavy oil:Oilsand bitumen can be slightly upgraded in Alberta (much cheaper than full upgrading) so it will at least flow down pipelines without adding diluents. End result? Twenty per cent more oil could flow through the same pipes.

2. Rail, rail, and more rail:About 100,000 bpd of oil (two oil trains a day - 80 tank cars each, 700 barrels per tank car) leave the province daily. It would not be difficult, analysts say, to move up to 800,000 to 1,000,000 bpd by rail on existing tracks.

The industry prefers pipelines for safety, reliability and less cost per barrel (about $8 less per barrel than rail). But, hey, if we can't build pipelines, rail will do. And nobody can stop railroads from carrying oil on existing track.

Oil could be shipped by CN from Edmonton to Prince Rupert. Just one wee problem. During the recent election now-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau promised no big oil tankers would be allowed to sail along the northern coasts of B.C. Who'd build a rail-to-ship transfer terminal in light of such a promise?

3. Rail to barely across the American border: The XL pipeline was vetoed by President Barack Obama because American federal government approval was needed to cross an international border.

But everything else about that pipeline was approved.

This scheme would see the XL pipeline(shipping oil south on one big, new pipeline to heavy-oil refineries of Texas and Louisiana) built right up to, but not across, the Canadian border. Nobody can stop Canadian oil coming into the USA by rail, then being transferred into pipeline on American soil.

4. North to Alaska! Remember the controversial Mackenzie Valley pipeline that was to carry natural gas from the Beaufort Sea, 1,200 kilometres south to Northern Alberta? By 2011, the $10 billion pipeline had been approved by governments and regulators. It wasn't built because of low gas prices.

The new idea is to build the pipeline sending Northern Alberta oil north rather than natural gas south. Our pipeline would hook into the under-utilized Alaska Pipeline that carries oil from Alaska's North Slope 1,300 kilometres south to the Alaskan oil port of Valdez.

There's also a proposal to send our oil to Alaska by a new dedicated only-only railroad. But the cost would be sky-high and regulatory approvals needed.

5. North to Churchill, Manitoba! Alberta oil could go by existing pipelines to Manitoba, then be transferred by rail to the port of Churchill on Hudson Bay. At Churchill, winterized tanker ships would break through the ice or follow ice-breakers. This route is very problematic - the rail line would need upgrading, terminal facilities would have to be built, oil tankers built to withstand extreme winter conditions.

Paradox is being piled upon paradox.

All this complexity and cost is caused by the growing Canadian conviction that fossil fuels are part of the climate change problem. Yet ultra-low emission fossil fuels are part of the climate change solution!!!!

Public opinion as reflected in government regulation, is forcing the oil industry to no longer build safe, quiet, reliable, cost-effective, hidden underground pipelines. New oil has to be shipped in not-as-safe, less reliable, more expensive, highly visible and noisy oil-tanker trains, only because nobody can stop those trains.

Because the rest-of-Canada believes oil is bad for climate change, Alberta's lifeblood is slowly being drained away.

In a tough, low-price environment, huge new costs are being associated with exporting oil beyond our borders.

It matters not that low-emission fossil fuels are part of the climate change solution, that oil sand extraction and refining is getting "greener" by the day.

It matters not. Our fellow Canadians - our friends and relatives in B.C., Ontario, Quebec - are convinced our oil, their oil, is part of the problem.

It is all so wrong. For all the wrong reasons, our golden goose has been killed and left to rot in the climate-change sun.

It is to weep for the future of Alberta.