An Atlanta terrorism suspect travelled to Canada in 2005 to meet with three members of an alleged Toronto extremist group to plot attacks on oil refineries in America, U.S. prosecutors said Monday at the start of his trial.

Prosecutors accuse Syed Haris Ahmed, 25, of providing material support for terrorism and seeking military training with a terror group in Pakistan.

In his opening remarks at a U.S. federal court in Atlanta, assistant U.S. attorney Robert McBurney portrayed Ahmed as a militant time bomb who sent enthusiastic, unencrypted emails to confederates.

Ahmed headed to Pakistan to sign up for jihad training, then backed out, McBurney alleged. He also shot surreptitious video of potential targets in Washington, D.C., and when the FBI showed up, he talked for hours without asking for a lawyer and provided a confession that fills hundreds of pages.

The court heard how Ahmed and a co-accused allegedly found some "Canadian brothers" online, and travelled to Toronto in 2005 to meet with three other would-be jihadists, identified only as Azdee, James and Jamal.

According to the prosecution, Ahmed proposed attacking U.S. oil refineries and storage tanks.

"I wanted to attack those places because oil is being stolen from Muslims," Ahmed is quoted as telling investigators in his confession.

The Canadian conspirators, he told the FBI, had even grander plans to attack global-positioning satellites.

"We discussed using either lasers or jammers to disrupt the GPS," Ahmed told the FBI. "This attack would cause confusion for everyone, including the military."

The Canadians had been under surveillance by CSIS, Canada's spy agency, which tipped off the FBI to Ahmed's alleged activities.

The Canadians, eventually nicknamed the "Toronto 18," were arrested in a series of high-profile raids in the summer of 2006.

Seven of those accused have since had their charges stayed or dropped. One suspect, a minor at the time of his arrest, was convicted in September of conspiring to bomb several targets. Another of the alleged group's members, Saad Khalid, 22, pleaded guilty last month in a Brampton, Ont., court to a charge of intending to cause an explosion.

The remaining individuals have yet to stand trial on a range of charges, including participating in a terrorist group, receiving training from a terrorist group and intending to cause an explosion that could cause serious bodily harm or death.

During his remarks to the court Monday, Ahmed's lawyer, Jack Martin, called his client's plotting childish and immature, more playing terrorist than terrorism.

"Where would they get the lasers?" Martin asked the court. "Radio Shack?"

But prosecutors argued Ahmed's plans didn't have to be realistic to constitute a conspiracy, and that just agreeing to carry them out was enough.

Ahmed faces 15 years in prison if convicted.