Evidence of meeting #26 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was aquifers.
A recording is available from Parliament.
9:05 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Bezan
We'll call meeting 26 to order. We'll continue, under Standing Order 108(2), our study of the oil sands and Canada's water resources.
Joining us for the first hour is James Bruce, an environmental consultant on climate and water.
Mr. Bruce, if you could make your opening comments and keep them under 10 minutes, we'd appreciate that.
June 9th, 2009 / 9:05 a.m.
James Bruce Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
Thank you very much for the opportunity to talk to you a little about, and to hear your questions about, water and the oil sands projects.
There are two main aspects to which I have given some study. One is the question of groundwater. That was done through the Expert Panel on Groundwater management in Canada, put in place by the Council of Canadian Academies. I think you have been sent copies of at least sections of that report. If you haven't received them, we'd be happy to provide you with copies of the Report in Focus—the short version of the report—in both official languages.
The other thing I would like to discuss is some earlier work I did from 2006 to 2008 for WWF Canada on trends in the flow of the Athabasca River and what they mean for water availability for the oil sands.
So if you give me enough time, I will try to cover both of these issues.
I'm sure you've had several other presentations, so you will be aware that the in situ recovery of bitumen at levels below about 75 metres is undertaken by steam injection to soften the bitumen and then to pump it back up to the surface. That steam injection, of course, requires water, and it's usually groundwater that's used. As for the amounts, they originally hoped it would in the order of half a barrel of water per barrel of recovered oil, but it now looks as if it's going to be substantially more than those values. It's very hard to get a good estimate. The original hope was also that they'd be able to use saline groundwater, but there are apparently some real problems with what to do with the salt when they take the water out of the ground. So they are using substantial quantities of natural groundwater.
In reviewing 11 case studies—eight in Canada and three in the United States—to get an idea of how sustainable our management of groundwater is, the panel selected a number of places across the country. One of them was the oil sands.
We relied heavily on the work of the Alberta Research Council in coming to our conclusions about the oil sands. Those appear on page 148 of our report. The questions that the Alberta Research Council raised in 2007 have not, to date, been satisfactorily answered—although, as I understand it, there is some motion towards getting some answers.
Let me review briefly what the Alberta Research Council said. They said that there was a whole bunch of unanswered questions.
How do low-flow levels in the Athabasca River affect shallow groundwater, and how does aquifer dewatering in the mine areas affect surface water systems?
What are the effects of increased mining activities on changing land cover or the effects of the diversion of groundwater out of mined areas on groundwater recharge?
How will changes in water quality resulting from aquifer disturbance and tailings pond leakage affect the quality of groundwater and surface water resources?
What data are required to assess the claim that deep injection of steam and waste does not negatively impact the regional and local aquifer systems? And are those data available?
What are the regional threshold objectives to ensure sustainable groundwater management?
And last, do planned developments have adverse impacts on water in adjoining jurisdictions, that is, the Northwest Territories and Saskatchewan, and on downstream ecosystems?
The panel concluded that those projects had gone ahead with a completely inadequate understanding of the groundwater regime in the area, and they are having significant impacts on the groundwater regime.
We used it as an example to try to illustrate the fact that it's very important to get the basic information on groundwater before you move ahead with projects that can have a significant influence on the groundwater.
So we considered it a pretty unsustainable situation. We could talk about that later, if you wish.
Now to turn to the Athabasca River as a source water mainly for the surface mining operations...and this involves scraping off of the bitumen, along with the peat and the trees and the near-surface groundwater, down to about 75 metres, which is fairly deep. In this case, we do know that each barrel of bitumen consumes an average of three barrels of freshwater, mainly from the river. This strip mining operation also changes the shallow groundwater interchanges with the river, and has even obliterated some small tributary watersheds and one-half of the large 1,500-square kilometre Muskeg Creek watershed. It's projected that as projects move to heavier clay deposits, even more water will be needed to recover the bitumen.
Let's take water quantity first. Water quantity and quality are the two issues. In the water-taking permits that have been given, the amounts allocated for oil sands projects appear to have been based—I reviewed a couple of the environmental impact statements—on a percentage of the long-term mean annual flow of the river, ignoring the fact that the flow of the river has been declining for the last 35 years due to shrinkage of the Athabasca Glacier by 25% and due to increased evapotranspiration in the basin as the water runs from the east slopes in the long trek across Alberta towards the oil sands. They're sometimes cited by industry as 2.2% of long-term average flows, but that's a meaningless figure. The water scientists around the world now believe that stationarity is dead. By this they mean that the amounts of water we've seen in rivers and lakes in the past is no indication of what we're going to see in the future because of the changing climate.
So using an average flow over a long period of time has two serious flaws. One is that the winter flows are much less than the summer, ten times or more less than the summer and spring flows, and it's the winter flows that are critical in protecting ecosystems in the river. The trends have been quite remarkable, as in some other rivers in southern parts of Canada. Average summer flows have declined 33% since 1970 and the minimum flows in winter, which is more worrisome, have declined by 27% in the most recent decade compared to the decade of the seventies.
These trends are bound to continue and may accelerate because of the decline in the glacier that feeds the river and the headwaters, the Athabasca Glacier, and acceleration of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere. Greenhouse gases were going up about 1.6 parts per million per year up until 2000. Since 2000 they've been going up at 1.9 parts per million per year.
Now, it's possible that the current economic downturn will give a little blip, but I don't think it's going to last for long. I think we're on a path towards much more rapid increase of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere because of increased emissions.
The drought in the early 2000s that helped cause the decline in flow was quite modest compared to past droughts, according to tree ring analysis, and is likely to be a very modest drought compared to future droughts if the climate change projections are anywhere close to right.
The winter flows are the lowest of the year, and Alberta has begun to recognize the importance of trying to maintain those flows in the winter. Their allocations to date don't take that into account. They've now developed a scheme to reduce the amount of water the oil sands projects take in the winter months to try to protect ecosystems. But if you look at the data, this means that in a typical year in the last little while, the oil sands projects would have only half of the water they say they're going to need with full development of the oil sands. If it's a very acute situation, they would have only about one third of the water they've projected they will need in the future for full development.
You have to recognize that only about 10% of the water withdrawn is returned to the river, since it becomes too polluted in the processing to do so. It's dumped into these huge tailing ponds or lakes that now cover 50 square kilometres or more. These lakes have high concentrations of toxic naphthenic acids and other contaminants, as many migratory birds have discovered. They also mobilize arsenic from natural sources in the watershed through the processes being used.
While reliable data are difficult to obtain because there is a lack of independent monitoring in the system, a presentation in Houston in 2007 indicated that these contaminants are seeping into groundwater and occurring in the sediments of the river already.
You have to recognize that the Athabasca is the most southern tributary of the Mackenzie River basin, and flows northward into the Arctic. The impacts of oil sands takings or water takings, both groundwater and surface water, on the flows of the Athabasca River northward into the Mackenzie have not really been taken into account.
My personal recommendation to you is that the federal government try to help ensure that under the Mackenzie basin agreement, negotiations are completed on a binding water-sharing and water quality protection agreement between Alberta, the Northwest Territories, Saskatchewan, B.C., and the Yukon.
Secondly, the Government of Alberta should consider withholding approval of any additional oil sands projects and related water-taking licences until the most critical of these issues raised by the Alberta Research Council are really addressed, and substantial water conservation measures are implemented in the project. I've heard that Suncor has reduced its water demand by about 30%. Let's get them all doing that, for goodness' sake.
Assurances also need to be made that the in-stream flow needs can be met to protect ecosystems and public health in the lower Athabasca, in the face of the changing climate and the declining flow of the Athabasca River. The companies need to reduce their water demands through a number of processes, which they know a lot more about than I do.
Since the oil sands projects are likely to be most adversely affected by climate change, they should redouble their efforts or make strong efforts to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions so they aren't contributing to the problem that will affect them in the very near future, and that is affecting them now.
The other thing is that we're looking at the water, but emissions from the developments into the atmosphere have effects on water downwind in Saskatchewan and in the Northwest Territories through airborne transport of pollutants such as acid rain and other things.
Those are my suggestions for improved federal involvement in this project.
9:20 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative James Bezan
Thank you very much, Mr. Bruce.
I believe there has been an agreement that we'll do the opening round at five minutes, to give everybody a chance to get up as quickly as possible.
So I do ask, Mr. Bruce, that when members ask questions, you keep your response as succinct as possible.
Mr. Scarpaleggia, please start us off.
9:20 a.m.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
Thank you.
Thank you, Dr. Bruce. We've heard or read that industry admits that there is seepage from the tailings ponds into the groundwater. But then we read that there is a lot of clay beneath the tailings ponds so this seepage is not problematic. We've also heard that the groundwater in that area gets somewhat contaminated but it's still usable, and that some sort of levelling of the quality of groundwater takes place and the water is still usable despite the seepage.
How do you view those kinds of claims? These claims are made--and signed off on, really--in environmental assessment panel reviews. There's an admission that there's seepage, but then the conclusion drawn is that it's not a problem.
9:20 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
I would make a couple of comments. One is that most of the geologists who have studied the area say there is no such thing as an impermeable layer, and that in fact there is seepage. It will take place either more quickly or more slowly, depending on the permeability, but it will take place. The fact that there are already naphthenic acids, which are only produced through the oil sands mining bitumen processing operation, in the sediments in the river would suggest that the stuff isn't staying in the groundwater.
Also, if you read the Alberta Research Council's analysis, and look at what is done in several environmental assessments—I don't know whether that's all, as I only looked at two—the concern for groundwater has been a very local one in the environmental assessments. What the Alberta Research Council is saying is that we should be looking at the groundwater flow on a regional basis and what's happening regionally.
So I'm not convinced that the contamination in the groundwater isn't seeping into the river.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
Also, when we were in Alberta speaking with industry representatives, the statistics kept cropping that 80% of oil sands development is through in situ, and when we look at in situ, 95% of the water used for in situ production is recycled. Therefore, the implication is that as we move more towards in situ, the issue of water consumption goes away or is diminished.
Perhaps you could give us your take on the impact of in situ on aquifers, and the knowledge gaps that exist in terms of that.
9:25 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
That's the problem. I think we don't have good knowledge at all of what the in situ SAGD extraction process has on groundwater. We don't know how much of that groundwater gets back down in. I don't know about the 95% figure, but if you look at what the Alberta Research Council says, they claim we really don't have a clue what the impact is on the regional groundwater and what the long-term effect will be of those projects.
But I would also say that we saw in the paper just the other day that another large project, the Imperial Oil Esso project, has been approved for the mining operation, so we're not finished with them yet.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Francis Scarpaleggia Liberal Lac-Saint-Louis, QC
Do you think there can be cross-boundary impacts going into the Northwest Territories and Saskatchewan? Just looking at the map, it's so vast that it's hard to understand intuitively how groundwater contamination around Fort McMurray could impact on groundwater and presumably surface water in the Northwest Territories and Saskatchewan.
9:25 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
There are two ways that can occur. One is if the groundwater seeps into the surface water--and there's evidence that's happening--and that surface water gets carried downstream a long way. The other thing is that atmospheric transport of contaminants could well be contaminating water in the downstream areas in other jurisdictions.
9:25 a.m.
Bloc
Bernard Bigras Bloc Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Dr. Bruce, thank you very much for being here with us this morning to help us understand the situation, particularly with regard to the quantity and quality of water.
9:25 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
I've understood you so far, but I'm not sure I'll understand your question.
My interpretation device is all tangled up at the moment. My apologies.
9:30 a.m.
Bloc
Bernard Bigras Bloc Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
First, I would like you to confirm the figures that I recently learned about. They deal with the flow of the Athabasca River and the water removals from it. According to documents I read, the river lost 20% of its flow between 1958 and 2003. I also read that, for all of the oil sands extraction projects, water removals from that river will need to be increased by 50%.
Could you confirm those figures? Are they accurate, to what percentage point?
9:30 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
From 1970 to 2005-06 there has been about a 33% decline in the summer flow and a 27% decline in the winter flow, which is more critical. I have no idea how much additional water will be needed in moving to the heavier clays in later extraction.
Was that the second part of your question?
9:30 a.m.
Bloc
Bernard Bigras Bloc Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
In 2006, I took part in the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Nairobi. I remember that the World Wildlife Fund and the Sage Foundation had published a report there. I was struck by some figures, and I took note of them. Apparently, Alberta was subject to 359 million cubic metres of water removals per year, just for the oil sand sector alone, and this was equal to twice the amount of water used by the city of Calgary. This isn't negligible; it's quite significant. At the end of the study, the report indicated that if the trend continued, Saskatchewan and the Northwest Territories would run out of water.
Is that forecast apocalyptic or realistic in your opinion?
9:30 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
The total quantity of water being used per year is approximately right. As you say, it is much more than the city of Calgary uses, to give some comparison.
The question of impacts downstream is rather tricky. There is no doubt that the withdrawal of water and the impact of the groundwater taken will likely have some impact on the flow of the rivers downstream in the Mackenzie system. That is ameliorated somewhat by the fact that they go through big lakes in the Peace-Athabasca delta before it gets into the Mackenzie River, and there are other big tributaries.
One of the things we found is that the Liard River, which flows into the west side of the Mackenzie from Yukon, has actually been going up in flow. That is a typical pattern with climate change. You see the northern rivers getting more snow, mainly off the more open sea. There's more flow there, and in the southern rivers you're getting much less flow. The Athabasca River is typical of the southern rivers.
The total flow of the Mackenzie River may not change a lot, but the inflow from the Athabaska River into the Peace-Athabaska delta and into the lakes that feed into the Mackenzie system is certainly going to have an effect.
9:30 a.m.
Bloc
Bernard Bigras Bloc Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC
As far as I can understand, we do in fact need to be concerned about water quantity and quality in areas located in proximity to the development, but the development also has an impact on areas located further away.
I would like to know whether we know enough about the state of the aquifer in Alberta. Studies are currently being done in order to ensure the fairest possible situation, but there are significant delays in various provinces.
9:35 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
No, and that is what the Alberta Research Council says. We don't know what impact the in situ projects are going to have on groundwater, and we don't know what the surface mining projects impact is on groundwater because that hasn't been studied. It is very difficult to study.
9:35 a.m.
Conservative
9:35 a.m.
NDP
Linda Duncan NDP Edmonton Strathcona, AB
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Dr. Bruce, for appearing before us. It is fabulous to have before us someone of your calibre in both climate change and water. We appreciate your taking the time.
I've noted in your report that there were concerns raised as far back as 2007 by the Alberta Research Council that those very substantive issues about the groundwater and surface water regime were not even being studied or documented yet. Which of those would you suggest be the priority? Are they all priorities to be proceeding with, and what role would you see the federal government playing in addressing those critical information gaps?
9:35 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
Let me say that when the groundwater panel looked at these examples across the country, the ones that we thought looked as if they were managing the groundwater sustainably, or very close to it, were ones in which Geological Survey had played an active role in understanding the geological conditions in which the groundwater flows and takes place. So I would assume that there would be a great benefit in having Geological Survey help with an understanding of what's happening in this area. That's on the science side.
On the policy side, it seems to me that the federal government has several policies that should perhaps be pursued more vigorously. One is the environmental assessment program and the impacts on fisheries and ecosystems downstream of leakage from the holding ponds. There are also the potential health impacts. In addition, the federal government has a role in ensuring that one jurisdiction's activities will not adversely affect other jurisdictions, like the territories and Saskatchewan, downstream and downwind of the oil sands projects.
9:35 a.m.
NDP
Linda Duncan NDP Edmonton Strathcona, AB
Thanks.
The Deputy Premier of the Northwest Territories, Mr. Miltenberger, also testified before us in Alberta several weeks ago. He similarly recommended that we need to be taking action on the Mackenzie River Basin Transboundary Waters Master Agreement. He's also called for an increased role for the federal government in the regulatory process.
The Deputy Premier stated his concern that there really has been no consultation with the Northwest Territories on existing or potential future impacts on the Slave and Mackenzie basin by these projects.
Can you provide to us a bit more, because you were involved, of course, in the development of this Mackenzie basin agreement? Can you tell us a bit about what the intent was, what it's supposed to offer, and which pieces are missing that the federal government could be helping to institute?
9:35 a.m.
Environmental Consultant, Climate and Water, As an Individual
Well, in the dim past of history, I was, I think, probably the first chair of the Mackenzie basin umbrella agreement, which was intended and still is intended to be an oversight agreement on this, I guess, third-largest basin in the world to try to ensure that the jurisdictions that do have responsibilities there work together to maintain the quality and the quantity of waters in the system.
Within that umbrella agreement involving six different jurisdictions, counting the federal government, the idea was that there would be specific agreements between jurisdictions to deal with particular water issues. To my knowledge, the only one that is completed or close to completed is the one between British Columbia and Alberta on the Peace River system because of the building of the Bennett Dam in B.C. affecting the flows of the Peace River. None of the other specific agreements between jurisdictions have been completed.
I think it's important that the initiative, through the Mackenzie basin umbrella agreement, be followed up, particularly in the case of Alberta and the territories.