OIL EXPEDITION

Open pit mines near Fort McMurray in Alberta, Canada. Left: September 22, 2000. Right: July 31, 2007. The oil sands from these mines provide refinery-ready raw crude oil and diesel fuel.

Image taken by NASA's Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER). Credit: NASA/GSFC/METI/ERSDAC/JAROS and the U.S./Japan ASTER Science Team.