Environment Committee on Nov. 28th, 2023

[Laurie Pushor]

We have always had a really open and collaborative relationship with Environment and Climate Change Canada colleagues at the field level. There has been an open and frank exchange of information to ensure that we all have the entire body of insight into any specific incident or matter. That's been ongoing for a number of years.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

We'll go to Mr. van Koeverden.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Pushor, for joining the environment committee again. I imagine you're a very busy person.

To recap, 5.3 million litres of industrial waste water at the Kearl oil sands operation north of Fort McMurray has been seeping into groundwater and reaching surface water at the site since at least May 2022.

In April, you provided this committee testimony that there is no evidence that process-affected water, which is a technical term for contaminated tailing effluent, has reached the waterways. Now we know that's not the case.

There have been contaminants found in water bodies, groundwater, muskeg, and tributaries of the Athabasca River, which is where members of the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation harvest food. It has also flowed as far north as the Northwest Territories, who were also not notified. I'd note that since this crosses a territorial and provincial border, it is certainly a concern for this committee and the federal government.

Why did you withhold those facts with respect to the contamination outside of the tailings ponds in your testimony in April?

[Laurie Pushor]

First of all, it's important to go back to the fact that there were two separate incidents at Kearl, the first one being seepage from the tailings pond, the second one being an overflow of a containment pond.

As we reported openly and transparently—and you can find information on our website, which I spoke about in April—the containment pond is a pond that collects snow melt and runoff and other water from across a mine site. It is important that water not be allowed to just run off the mine site, so it is put into containment ponds. It is tested and monitored to ensure among other things total suspended solids are settled to an acceptable level that meets the expectation.

It was that pond, the second incident, that happened just at the time the emergency protection order was being prepared, that overflowed. It overflowed water that, while it may have some level of contaminants in it, is predominantly runoff as I indicated. It was -30 at the time of that event, and most of that water was captured in the containment system and/or froze in close proximity to the edge of the mine site.

As such, Imperial was able to recover the vast majority of that water and return it back onto the mine site into the proper ponds.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Pushor. It's still clear that a lot of that effluent has reached natural ecosystems. The Kearl site disaster highlighted the apparent inability of oil companies to responsibly manage their waste, which is, quite frankly, a disregard of the danger it poses to ecosystems and human health.

You acknowledged today in one response that leakage is actually anticipated with these earthen dams, as you put it. Contamination isn't actually a failure of the systems or your regulations; leakage is actually a feature of them.

The Alberta Energy Regulator has continually referred to this as a communications problem since you did not notify indigenous nations of this incident for nine months, leaving them unaware of the risks of consuming any of the water or the game harvested in this area,

These disasters ought to be prevented, not designed into the plans for resource extraction. It's fairly clear to me that the resources in Alberta have not actually been provided in a safe or environmentally responsible manner, which is, as you stated, your mandate. The Alberta Energy Regulator has refused to admit any wrongdoing or accountability to date. At one point in your testimony you said, and you just repeated, that since water was frozen in wells, there's no way to test it.

We're talking about an oil drilling company. Is there really no technology to test contaminated ice for dangerous chemicals?

[Laurie Pushor]

I guess I'd start by talking about the earthen dams that you mentioned as seeming somehow to be unique to oil sands. They are not. Earthen dam structures are designed to allow fluids to seep—

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

Respectfully, my question was with respect to ice and testing ice for contaminants.

[Laurie Pushor]

I think you had several questions. I'm going to do my best to address them in the order that you were raising them.

It isn't just unique to the oil sands that earthen dams allow seepage to move through them and have containment systems that intercept that seepage. That protects the integrity of the structures. We will continue to do our best to monitor across the Peace on these matters.

I'm sorry. I'm distracted.

[Adam van Koeverden, Liberal, Milton, ON]

That's okay, Mr. Pushor.

It's obvious to me there's a lot of cleaning up to do around the Kearl site and other sites more broadly across the oil sands as well. These tailings ponds have demonstrated they consistently pose serious risk to human and animal health.

My question for you is: Who ought to be accountable for these or future leakages? Do you think it ought to be a taxpayer obligation to clean up this environmental disaster or should the financial obligation be borne by the oil and gas companies, such as Imperial who have posted record profits just in the third quarter of 2023—for Imperial, over $1.6 billion?

Who should pay to clean up this mess and prevent future leaks and harm to human health and the environment?

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Very briefly, please, Mr. Pushor.

[Laurie Pushor]

Chair, I'm struggling a bit. You're asking me to respond very briefly to a wide-ranging commentary far beyond the Kearl matter that I was asked here to speak to. I'm happy to comment on that, but given the wide-ranging nature of it, I'm not sure what your thoughts are as chair in terms of what's appropriate in this conversation, but I will try my best to respond.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

I think we're out of time. We'll have to move to the next.... We're actually going to another round.

I understand that at times the questions are wide ranging, but we have a time—

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

Point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Yes, Ms. Goodridge.

[Laila Goodridge, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Cold Lake, AB]

I appreciate I am new on this committee and I am a sub. However, it's generally a space where the person asking the question has a certain amount of time allotted to ask their question. The witnesses are then given the same amount of time to provide an answer.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

That's not how it works here. We basically have a block of time. The exchange occurs within that.

I think Mr. Pushor made his point, in my view.

We'll have to go on now to Mr. Mazier.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Thank you, Chair.

Mr. Pushor, if you want to respond, keep on responding for a brief minute, and then I can get on with my questions.

[Laurie Pushor]

The most recent commentary talked about mine reclamation. I've had the opportunity to spend some time in the mine region, in addition to the two visits I made to the Kearl site over the course of the summer. I would note that the companies work very diligently to ensure they're operating the sites in an effective way, to operate in a way that allows for the best reclamation approach possible. It is clearly the obligation of the operator, the owner of the mine, to restore and fully reclaim the landscape once mining is completed.

There's a mine financial security program in place in Alberta. We oversee that it is being met under the terms of that program. Make no mistake that it is the operators of the mines that are obligated for the reclamation.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Thanks for that clarification.

Mr. Pushor, the trust between the Alberta Energy Regulator and many communities has been broken because of the lack of communication. It's very concerning to hear about the failure to communicate with local communities and first nations on this matter, because so many livelihoods depend on Canada's energy sector. Many Canadians rely on Alberta's energy industry for good-paying jobs and paycheques. When Canada's energy industry succeeds, Canadians succeed, in my opinion.

What have you done to regain the trust of Albertans, and what more do you plan to do?

[Laurie Pushor]

We've had the opportunity to visit the communities fairly regularly over the course of the last several months. They've been generous with their thoughts and their advice and guidance to us. We're doing our best to learn from that and implement new processes and new protocols. When I've sat in the communities and heard people first-hand, it's been very helpful to have the right context and understanding of their interest in that regard.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Is there going to be an opportunity for...what you heard? I think this is almost like a whole new world in communicating and trying to regain trust. You can go and meet all you want, but at the end of the day, communities are going to have to realize that this handshake does mean something to the regulator and to the community.

Even in the review that Deloitte has done and is communicating on, is there something that stands out that you think would really help with this?

You mentioned websites and things like that, but for really understanding what the communities require to regain that trust, is there something you can point towards?

[Laurie Pushor]

As I indicated, we've been providing weekly updates to the communities up in the northeast since late in February. We've undertaken to be face to face with those communities as a starting place, so that when we know each other we can start to build relationships where we can reach out and make sure we understand what is happening.

We've had a good open exchange and dialogue around the information that is in those weekly updates. In addition to that, we've posted all submissions that we've received since the start of the EPO to our website, so that those communities can also see all of that information. We've instructed Imperial to be engaged and to provide all the information to the communities as well.

That dialogue seems to be informing us and the communities on what information is available and the best way to provide it to them.

There's always work to do in this space. We'll be open and engaged for doing our best in that space. I've been fortunate to be able to talk to several community leaders throughout the last few months. They are very frank with me and they will hold us to account.

The AER is committed to doing its best to meet those expectations, including the expectations of your colleague from Fort McMurray that we do a better job of keeping her office informed.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

What role does the federal government have in your operations?

[Laurie Pushor]

There is none that I am aware of specifically, but we do collaborate extensively where there's overlap with Environment and Climate Change Canada. As we get into impacts on fish, wildlife, waterfowl or any of the streams, we would have full and transparent exchanges of information.

As you know, in Alberta, the initial notifications are done through a collaborative notification process called EDGE. Each receiving organization has its own protocols on what types of incidents they should be advised of. Environment and Climate Change Canada has its protocols and expectations for the folks at Alberta Transportation, who operate that notification system, as do we. That's the first point of exchange for that information.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Ms. Taylor Roy.