Rockland — There will be a Tar Sands Pipeline protest on Friday, Jan. 25, at noon at TD Bank, 34 School St. in Rockland. The public is invited.

TD Bank advertises that it is number one in the Oil Sands Sector, according to a news release.

"TD Bank is #1 in trading oil sands stocks.

• TD Bank is #1 in oil sands Mergers & Acquisitions.

• TD bank is the third-largest shareholder in Suncor, which specializes

in producing crude oil from Athabasca oil sands and is the world's

largest producer of bitumen.

• TD bank is largest shareholder in TransCanada, the owner of the

proposed Keystone XL Pipeline," the news release states.

Money in accounts at TD Bank is supporting tar sands mining, refining, transport, and use, endangering global climate for corporate profit, the news release states.

The boreal forest of Alberta, Canada, was once a lush and thriving eco-system. This changed when oil prices rocketed and billions of dollars could be made exploiting the region's tar sands oil deposits. Today Canada's oil producers clear cut miles of ecosystem to extract oil saturated deep in the soils of the boreal forest. An area roughly the size of Florida is open for various forms of mining and ecological degradation. The regions of Alberta touched by Canadian oil companies have been transformed into marred landscape of open-pit mines, smoke stacks, and ponds of wastewater containing carcinogenic chemicals. The lush ecosystem has been systematically destroyed, according to the news release.