From VancouverObserver.com

Too little regulation, too much risk: An argument against the oil sands

In August 2013, the author paddled down the Athabasca River from Fort McMurray to Fort Chipewyan with 9 other paddlers from Canada and the United States to see impacts of the oil sands on communities downstream.

Eli Pivnick - Oct 6th, 2013

I am responding to the article in the Vancouver Observer, "There is a way out: Preventing oil sands health tragedy from becoming Canada's permanent legacy", October 2, 2013, written by Courtney Howard, an emergency room physician, mother, and board member of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE). While I have great respect for CAPE and their accomplishments, and agree with most of what Dr. Howard has to say, I do not think she goes anywhere near far enough. Like Dr. Howard, I have begun my own investigations into the oil sands.

The reason that Dr. Howard found virtually no clinical studies by government concerning the reportedly high rates of cancer and other diseases in communities affected by the oil sands industry is because it would appear that that is the way the federal and Alberta governments and the oil industry want it.  I interviewed Dr. John O'Connor, chief medical officer for Fort McKay and Fort Chipewyan in August 2013. His initial concerns of high incidence of cancer and other diseases in Ft Chip in 2006 were responded to by both federal and Alberta governments with complaints against him to the Alberta College of Physicians for creating "undue alarm." 

After the College dropped their investigation of these complaints, Dr. O'Connor was involved in planning health studies with Alberta Health first in Fort Chipewyan and then in Fort McKay. Both studies were cancelled unilaterally by Alberta Health. In the Ft Chip case, Alberta Health wanted the oil sands industry involved in the study. The community of Ft Chipewyan felt that this was a conflict of interest and refused. As a result, Alberta Health cancelled the study. In the Ft McKay case, Dr. O'Connor does not know why the study was cancelled as Alberta Health personnel would not return phone calls. 

In 2009,  Alberta Health did conclude a cancer study on the Ft Chip population which their officials claimed showed no cause for concern.  In 2010, the study was peer reviewed by Dr. Gina Solomon, currently Deputy Secretary for Science and Health at the California Environmental Protection Agency. She concluded that the rates of lymphomas and leukemia were 3 times higher than expected in Fort Chipewyan, and that the rates of bile duct cancers were seven times higher than expected. She also pointed out that these specific cancers have been shown to be linked to exposure to oil and petrochemical products.   Amid continued reports of health concerns, a new three-year health study in Fort Chipewyan overseen by the University of Calgary is now being initiated.  

For years, Dr David Schindler, a University of Alberta aquatic ecologist, has been saying that government environmental monitoring of the oil sands has been inadequate. In studies published in 2009 and 2010 by University of Alberta scientists Erin Kelly, David Schindler, and others, there is strong evidence of important and growing environmental contamination of the Athabasca River by the oil sands. They found that high levels of air pollution are falling to the snow-covered ground in winter in a 50 km radius of the Suncor and Syncrude upgraders. The toxins are undoubtedly being flushed into the Athabasca River and its tributaries by meltwaters in the spring.   

They characterized the resulting contamination of the Athabasca River as "the equivalent of a major oil spill every spring".  Of course, on top of this is the leakage from the toxic lakes resulting from oil sands projects. According to Schindler, it is 99% certain that the toxic water is leaching into aquifers, ground water and the Athabasca River. 

Another study published in 2013 by John Smol of Queen's University and Derek Muir of Environment Canada found that oil sands activity is also polluting remote lakes with PAHs (poly-cyclic hydrocarbons), some of which are known carcinogens. They report that the level of pollution is no worse than in urban settings, but is rapidly accumulating.     

There are also the many accidental spills including the one in the Primrose project operated by Canadian National Resources Ltd, which, as of September 16, was still not under control after 4 months, and had so far leaked 1.4 million liters of bitumen.       

As a result of the University of Alberta study finding significant impacts on water quality due to oil sands activity where Alberta's own monitoring program had found none, the federal government commissioned the Oil Sands Advisory Panel to examine the province's monitoring program. Their final report in December, 2010, found major deficiencies in the program design, inadequate analytical capabilities, insufficient sampling, no understanding of pre-development baseline conditions, and no leadership on reporting on oilsands environmental performance.     

In response, the federal and Alberta governments announced a new "world class" monitoring system: the Joint Canada-Alberta Implementation Plan for Oil Sands Monitoring (JOSM). This makes sense except that the Alberta government had been claiming for years that they already had an excellent monitoring system in place. In fact, I was still able to read in August 2013  in an oil sands  information pamphlet I was given at the Ft McMurray airport, that the "oil sands industry has no significant impact on the Athabasca River".   

As Howard points out, and I would agree, the available data base of the new joint monitoring system so far "falls far short of being a comprehensive resource."  It is also under the control of the Albertan Minister of Environment and Sustainable Resource Development rather than being at arm's length from government and industry. Clearly, the Alberta government does not take seriously the concept of conflict of interest. As another example, the head of the newly formed Alberta Energy Regulator is Gerard Protti, a senior executive for Encana from 1995 and 2009, and the inaugural president of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.    It also took an Alberta court ruling on October 2 to force the Alberta Energy Regulator to allow the Oil Sands Environmental Coalition to participate in the regulatory review of a proposed oil sands project.

People in the area do not need to be told that there are pollution problems with the Athabasca River coming from the oil sands. No one drinks the river water anymore. The Ft Chip commercial fishing industry died a decade ago because no one would buy their fish, knowing that they were downstream of the oil sands. The local fish-packing plant sits idle. (John Regney, Special Projects Manager for the Athabascan Chipewyan First Nation, Personal Communication)  Also, because of the high and growing incidence of deformed, discoloured and tumour-bearing fish, few locals from Ft McMurray to Fort Chipewyan will eat the fish. (Local eagles, osprey, and otters do not have that luxury.) I heard the same story over and over as we traveled on the river from Ft McMurray to Ft Chipewyan. The last such story I heard was from John Regney, Special Projects Manager for the Athabascan Chipewyan First Nation, who has lived in Ft Chip for 40 years and has raised his children there. On his last fishing outing, he said that three out of five fish caught had tumours. He also had his second experience this spring of fish that taste of gasoline. He rarely fishes anymore. 

The level of pollution in the tar sands is an abrogation of indigenous treaty rights which include the right to hunt, fish and carry out traditional activities. How can Aboriginal people do that if they cannot eat the fish or drink the water, and if their land is occupied by the biggest industrial project on the planet? The latest insult in this regard was the decision made by the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) which was released the day before we started our trip. We heard about it first from Rod Hyde, the husband of the late, former chief of Fort McKay First Nation, Dorothy McDonald. The AER approved a lease for a new SAGD (Steam assisted gravity drainage) tar sands project (the Dover Commercial Project by Brion Energy Corporation).  It is adjacent to Fort McKay FN lands referred to as the Moose Lake Reserve, 50 km northwest of Fort McKay. According to the Fort McKay FN website:
"This particular area in our traditional territory is sacred to the community of Fort McKay and is the resting place of many of our ancestors."

"Moose Lake is one of the only areas far enough away from oil sands development where the people of Fort McKay can hunt, trap, fish, and pick berries safely and in peace. Fort McKay First Nation is committed to the protection and preservation of Moose Lake in order to ensure our children and grandchildren have a clean, peaceful place to keep our traditions and culture alive."

Apparently this will soon no longer be the case. The Ft McKay Band had asked for a 20 km buffer zone around the lake for the above reasons. They are being granted 1.2 km. The band is appealing the decision.    

If allowed to continue as it is, when the oil sands boondoggle finally ends, my best guess is that the reclamation of the forests, wetlands, lakes and rivers despoiled by oil sands development, estimated to eventually cover the surface area of Greece, will be left with Alberta First Nations, the Canadian taxpayer and the fish and the wildlife to deal with, while oil companies make a quick exit citing bankruptcy or whatever the latest ploy will be to avoid taking responsibility. This will be very similar to what Dr. Howard describes as the current situation in Yellowknife with the now abandoned Giant Mine being the country's biggest toxic waste site. The difference is that the oil sands area will be much bigger: much more spread out and with much higher amounts of toxins, and most will never be reclaimed according to David Schindler.      

Dr. Howard states that "the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment believes that the people of the Athabasca region and of the Mackenzie River system deserve a truly world-class monitoring system, and that all of our children deserve meaningful action promoting climate health."  So do I, but I do not think that a proper monitoring system will help much, and it is clear that it is being used as one more delaying tactic by industry and government.   

It is high time that Albertans and Canadians demand that not only no more new projects be approved in the oil sands, but that current ones be considerably slowed down. At the same time Canadians deserve a chance to determine what is reasonable given our need to protect human health, maintain a healthy environment, meet Aboriginal treaty obligations, receive fair economic recompense in taxes from oil sands profits, and decide on a rate of extraction that is reasonable with regard to ongoing climate change.  We know enough now to recognize that what is being done today in the oil sands is completely unacceptable to a sane country. Based on oil sands activity, I am not sure if Canada currently fits that description.

Eli Pivnick, PhD, is a former research scientist for Agriculture Canada and currently a high school teacher in Kamloops, BC. In August 2013, Pivnick paddled down the Athabasca River from Ft McMurray...Read Eli Pivnick's bio »