EDMONTON - Premier Ed Stelmach would like the U.S. president to come visit Alberta’s oilsands to help ease Barack Obama’s mind about environmental concerns surrounding the contentious Keystone XL pipeline.

“All I can say to the President and any of the staff that were giving the president advice, I would suggest come and visit. Come see for yourself,” Stelmach said. “It gives us an opportunity to tell the Alberta story.”

He said such a visit in 2010 helped Hollywood movie director James Cameron get a more positive impression of northern Alberta’s vast oil industry. Many U.S. senators and more recently a large group from Bavaria have also flown over the oilsands and were surprised at the vastness of Alberta, since they previously thought the oilsands were minutes outside Edmonton, Stelmach said.

But on Wednesday, Obama raised concerns about the industry and about the Keystone XL pipeline, designed to transport millions of barrels of oilsands crude from Canada to refineries in the U.S. Gulf Coast.

“These tarsands, 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 said, using the word favoured by environmentalists — “tarsands” — instead of “oilsands” to describe the energy source.

Stelmach said the statement doesn’t clearly indicate if Obama is concerned about the pipeline itself or Alberta’s environmental rules.

“Kinda raised my blood pressure,” Stelmach said of Obama’s comments during Thursday night’s Premier’s speech at the Shaw Conference Centre. “But we can’t just ignore it. We will have a land use plan we can point to that responds directly to those criticisms and that is predicated upon industry and as importantly, Albertans’ continued input.”

Stelmach said politics also likely influenced Obama’s words, since the president has said he’s going to run for a second term in office.

“He’s got to find a balance between the NGOs, the anti-oil folks and of course he also wants to grow jobs,” Stelmach said, noting that Obama has recently highlighted Alberta is key for secure, stable oil.

“The security of the American way of life is predicated in no small measure on a friendly supply of energy. And it’s a message we have been driving home with opinion leaders from California to Washington DC,” Stelmach said in his speech.

Yet he said it would be inappropriate for him to extend a direct invite to Obama, though he could send letters to advisers, governors or senators.

“I’d like to do it through the prime minister,” Stelmach said. “I know the current prime minister supports the oilsands. We’ll see what happens through the election. “

jsinnema@edmontonjournal.com

twitter.com/jodiesinnema