Obiter Dicta Issue 13 - March 23, 2015 | Page 10

special report 10  Obiter Dicta A Plan Without Enforcement is no Plan at all Alberta unveils new rules regarding tailing ponds and water extraction in oils sands production amy brubacher › contributor A lberta has released a new set of rules that it says are designed to limit water use from the Athabasca River. In addition, compa nies will be expected to diminish the growth of tailings ponds (pools of wastewater from bitumen extraction) and ensure that these ponds have been reclaimed within ten years of the end of a mining project. While these new rules are being trumpeted as a way of improving the environmental sustainability of the oil sands in relation to Alberta’s critical fresh water resources, many are critical of this plan. Kyle Fawcett, Alberta’s Minister of Environmental and Sustainable Resource Development, stated that the new water-use limits “are dramatic cutbacks for all operators but they are essential in protecting the lower Athabasca.” Yet the true challenge here is not about setting limits or creating frameworks. The challenge for Alberta is to actually stand by them, develop mechanisms for enforcement, and prosecute breaches. The tremendous use of fresh water by oil sands producers has been well documented. In 2011, operations used approximately 1.7 million cubic metres of water—a figure equivalent to the residential water use of 1.7 million Canadians. In situ petroleum production used in the oil sands requires the use of heated water. At present, these techniques use approximately 0.8 to 1.7 barrels of water in order to fully extract and upgrade a barrel of oil. Processing bitumen requires 0.4 barrels of water for every barrel of bitumen produced. Members of Canada’s Oil Sands Innovation Alliance (including Suncor Energy Inc. and Royal Dutch Shell plc) have pledged to halve freshwater use in processing to 0.2 barrels per barrel of bitumen by 2022. In addition, Alberta’s seventy-seven square miles of tailings ponds have been one of the industry’s most