With rising oil prices and the possibility of a Tory majority, the future is looking brighter for northern Alberta’s massive oil sands development.

Observers say Conservative Party gains in the May 2 federal election would translate into more federal support for the sector, particularly in the form of a delayed phase out of subsidies for oil and gas producers.

But the Harper government is also pushing to close a popular corporate loophole that would slow write-offs of lease expenses and mine investments, a shift intended to boost the tax load on energy companies that have seen profits surge on triple-digit crude oil.

And while the Tory platform on the environment touts government actions to address climate change, Conservative environment minister Peter Kent has also defended oil sands output as an “ethical” and secure alternative to supplies from foreign producers with spotty records on the environment and human rights.

“There has been a demonizing of a legitimate resource,” Kent said after his appointment to the portfolio in January.

“It is ethical oil. It is regulated oil. And it’s secure oil in a world where many of the free world’s oil sources are somewhat less secure.”

The Conservatives platform supports “economically viable” clean-energy projects that help provinces and other regions move away from the use of fossil fuels, but it makes no commitment to act on phasing out fossil fuel subsidies.

It fails to even mention the oil sands, the fastest-growing source of greenhouse gas pollution in Canada. Extracting the black gold generates two to four times the amount of greenhouse gases per barrel versus production of conventional oil.

Environmentalists cite widespread damage to Canada’s carbon-absorbing boreal forest, degradation of the land’s ability to support forestry and farming, and the creation of toxic tailings ponds.

The NDP election platform commits to developing cumulative oil sands impact assessments, supports measures to protect fishery and trans-boundary waters — and would implement “science-based” monitoring and enforcement.

The Liberals promise increased federal oversight of oil sands development, but there are few details in the party’s election platform on how a Liberal government would address the environmental impacts.

Liberal Party Leader Michael Ignatieff has even stepped in line with the Conservatives on the oil sands at times.

Ignatieff, asked about the oil sands in a town hall meeting in Vancouver in January, responded: “This is where a chill falls over the room because everybody expects me to say they’re terrible and shut them down,” he said “Absolutely not.” He went to tell the audience they were “awe-inspiring.”

Two days later, Ignatieff told The Calgary Herald editorial board that the resource “massively increases Canada’s geopolitical importance, above all, to the United States. They have to be aware of one simple fact, that Canada exports more petroleum to the United States than Saudi Arabia.

“This is a very important partnership and they should balance their legitimate environmental concerns with an understanding of just how important the oil sands are to the future of the American economy.”

The point was brought home Thursday when Suncor Energy Inc. chief executive Rick George said Alberta’s oil sands reserves may double with the use of new technology. Still, the wildcard is U.S. President Barack Obama, who has sent mixed signals on his intentions.

The week he called the oil sands potentially destructive, but said the mining process can be made cleaner through measures including carbon capture and storage.

“These tar sands, there are some environmental questions about how destructive they are, potentially, what are the dangers there, and we’ve got to examine all those questions,” Obama told an energy town hall meeting in Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania.

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In a speech in late March as civil war in Libya caused world oil prices to spike past $110 per barrel, Obama said the U.S. would slash foreign imports by a third over a decade. But he added that America would continue to view Canada as an important source of “steady, stable and reliable” crude.

“I think he singled out Canada pretty clearly as part of the solution, rather than part of the problem. So we feel very good about that,” said Tom Huffaker, vice-president of policy and environment for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, a Calgary-based industry group.

He said Obama’s remarks bode well for U.S. approval of a controversial $13 billion pipeline that will ship 435,000 barrels of raw bitumen daily from Athabasca to U.S. Gulf Coast refineries.

The TransCanada Keystone XL project has the green light in Canada but must still be approved by the U.S. State Department. It faces significant opposition from environmentalists and some state politicians who worry about possible spills among other environmental impacts.

The Obama administration also said Wednesday it will “take a fresh look” at plans issued under the prior Bush administration to develop commercial oil shale and oil sands in three U.S. states.

The Interior Department said its Bureau of Land Management plans to review the environmental impact of allocating oil shale and oil sands resources on federal government-owned lands in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming.

The BLM in 2008, during the administration of President George W. Bush, issued an environmental impact statement on making 1.9 million acres of public lands available for oil shale development and 431,244 acres to lease for oil sands development.

“With commercial development of oil shale at least several years away, the new planning process will allow the BLM to take a fresh look at what public lands are best suited for oil shale and oil sands development,” the agency said.

“Final land-use decisions will be made in light of any new information about potential resource needs.”

Many environmental groups in the U.S. oppose oil sands and oil shale because of the impact of their extraction process and the high level of greenhouse gases they generate. Green groups argue the oil sands development, in particular, conflicts with the Obama administration’s efforts to fight global warming.

Canada is the largest supplier of crude oil and refined products to the United States, supplying about 20 per cent of total U.S. imports. This proportion is expected to increase in coming decades as bitumen production grows while conventional oil production declines.