Environment Committee on Nov. 28th, 2023

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witness for being back at our committee.

In your last testimony to us, you claimed there were no contaminants found in the waterways. In fact, we even talked about that today in the previous discussions.

Given this statement, how do you explain that, prior to your testimony, Imperial staff told ACFN inspectors that dissolved iron was found in waterbody 3? Then, on April 3, 2023, a test showed F2 hydrocarbons and napthenic acids in waterbody 3. On March 10, 2023, ECCC said the waterway had become “deleterious, or harmful, to fish”.

We are also seeing a high incidence of bile cancer. Chief Adam's father-in-law passed away. Seventeen other people have passed away because of bile cancer. The normal incidence is one in 100,000, so it's a rare cancer affecting them. You mentioned that Health Canada is looking at it.

All this information was available prior to our last meeting. Why were we not made aware of it, given the opportunity you had to speak about that—and today, in fact?

[Laurie Pushor]

Well, as I indicated, the monitoring done on the Firebag, Muskeg and Athabasca rivers is collaborative, involving Environment and Climate Change Canada, Alberta's Environment and Protected Areas department and local communities. When you examine that data, you will not.... I am advised there are no anomalies or indications that anything from the Kearl situation made it to those water bodies. That's what I was referring to. In addition to that, we have compelled Imperial to do increased monitoring along the Firebag to ensure we keep a close watch on any suggestion that something might be happening there. Most importantly, we've done an extensive requirement for them to drill monitoring wells and continue to monitor what's happening in the groundwater. We'll continue to keep a very close eye on that.

When the waterbody 3 napthenic acids and F2 hydrocarbons results were shown, it was for a very brief period of time in one part of that water body. Waterbody 3 is an integral part of the approved mine plan. Because they haven't commenced using it yet, we expect them to preserve it as a healthy wetland. Steps were taken immediately to protect that water body and ensure a fish barrier was put in place, so the migration of the minnows that exist in that water body couldn't occur. Monitoring was enhanced. It's fair to say that the water body returned to stable, healthy...all within the testing standards throughout the summer.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

It's also worth noting that it reached Muskeg. How do you account for the Muskeg leakage? How is that remediated?

[Laurie Pushor]

I'm not sure what you're referring to. There's no evidence that any of the tailings seepage has reached the Muskeg River.

[Lloyd Longfield, Liberal, Guelph, ON]

I have alternative information on that.

If we look at the design in the first place.... One question I had back in April was on how many other tailings ponds could be experiencing the same problems. This tailings pond was designed to have vertical leakage, but now the leakage happening is going sideways. Common fill was used versus clay fill, which was the cheaper option. Now the leakage is coming out sideways, where it wasn't designed to in the first place. We have French drainage systems and pumps being installed. We're trying to, after the fact, pump the tailings fluids back into the tailings pond faster than they are getting out of the tailings pond. The 150 wells that were drilled haven't found the edge of the seepage yet. We don't have a well that isn't reporting seepage.

Have any other Alberta properties reported any other problems that we need to be aware of?

[Laurie Pushor]

As I indicated in April, one of the steps we took early on after the EPO was issued was to compel all other operators to do an examination of their tailings ponds with an eye to what we understood was happening at Kearl, and to provide us with a report of their assessment based on that. We continued to look through all of that.

It's encouraging, at this point, but we will stay very vigilant to ensure we understand what's happening across the region.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Mr. Garon, you have two and half minutes.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Garon.

Mr. Pushor, I’d like to come back to my colleague Mr. Bachrach’s comments.

Four pumping wells were activated in 2021 to contain infiltrations of over 1 billion litres of groundwater. We understand that water has a natural flow, but you should know that as of March 2022, samples taken from the Muskeg River indicated sulfite levels 18 times higher than in 2021. This was proven.

You understand that, from the perspective of a normal, intelligent person, it’s hard to believe that you weren’t aware that there was a problem.

[Laurie Pushor]

We have received information. It was the report of some staining on the ground that caused us to heighten our oversight of what was happening in this area and to compel Imperial to take extensive actions to identify the source of this.

I think it's important that as we talk about these things, we remember there were two incidents at Kearl. One was an incident involving tailing seepage. The other was an overflow from a containment pond. Containment ponds are intended to hold water that has run off or snowmelt from across the mine site to ensure that they are in a good state before they're released from the mine site.

I'm not sure of the volumes the member's responding—

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Pushor, I understand. My time is limited.

My colleague Mr. Longfield alluded to tests conducted on April 3, 2023, which showed that there were F2 hydrocarbons and napthenic acids in the same body of water.

Yet we keep hearing you say that the water is safe. Are you telling us that none of these substances can adversely affect human health?

[Laurie Pushor]

I'm telling you that the monitoring results we've seen around the entire Kearl tailings pond and in waterbody 3 are stable or declining, which is what we want to see as we examine the effectiveness of the enhancements to the containment system.

We will be diligent for a long period of time and monitoring this to ensure that we can be confident the enhancements to the containment system that were installed are working effectively. We'll then contemplate what else needs to happen.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Thank you.

Mr. Bachrach, you have two and half minutes.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Pushor, in your previous comments, you suggested that the exceedances that were noted in the annual reports were from within the containment system, yet the information I have indicates there are very concerning trends in the monitoring results from outside the lease area. This is in the environment outside of Imperial's lease. Particularly, there are increasing values for naphthenic acids in the off-site regional monitoring well.

Don't these results in the off-site regional monitoring well indicate that both Imperial and the Alberta Energy Regulator were aware of and investigating contamination off site?

[Laurie Pushor]

First of all, you're taking me into the circumstances that occurred prior to the issuing of the environmental protection order. Everything in that body of work at that time is part of the investigation that is ongoing.

I want to point out that we have inspectors who go out, review and examine things and take action as required to do things. However, in addition to that, we have independent investigators who investigate whether any other proceedings should occur in an incident of this nature.

I'm not able to get into specific details of what did or didn't happen. That is a part of the investigation.

[Taylor Bachrach, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

I'll read from an article on Imperial's 2021 report which says:

“[Process affected water] seepage, or potential early arrival of [such water], was reported at 11 monitoring locations in 2021, indicated by trends and/or [control objective] exceedances in multiple [...parameters]”, it says.

The article goes on to say:

Substances found at concentrations above desired limits [include] naphthenic acids, dissolved solids and sulphates—a common proxy for hydrocarbon residue.

It seems clear that the Alberta Energy Regulator was aware there was contamination in the environment outside the lease area, and it has been aware of that for many years. I'm interested in what actions have been taken by the regulator to stop that contamination.

All of a sudden, in 2022, when that discoloured surface water showed up, it seems the regulator flew into action and compelled Imperial to build French drains and all sorts of additional containment facilities—wells, pumps—in addition to the original design, which indicates to me that the system wasn't working, as you had indicated earlier, and that in fact there was a failure of the design, which required this.

We want to understand how far back the failure goes. How long has toxic tailings water been seeping into the environment? How much of that toxic tailings water has already made its way into the waterways and downstream? That is at the heart of the question we're trying to get at.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

Unfortunately, we're really over time on this.

[Laurie Pushor]

As I indicated to you, all of the conduct of Imperial would be a matter of our investigations in the two incidents in question, so I'm not able to speak to specifics.

[The Chair, Liberal, Francis Scarpaleggia]

That's understood.

Mr. Pushor, we're really over time here. It doesn't mean Mr. Bachrach can't come back with this question or that you can't answer it in another context, but, really, in the interest of fairness, I have to stop there.

We'll go now to Mr. Kram.

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Pushor, for being here today.

Mr. Pushor, in your opening statement, you talked briefly about the Deloitte report and how it recommended that the Alberta Energy Regulator collaborate with first nations communities.

Can you expand on that a bit? What other recommendations are in the Deloitte report, and how are you responding to those recommendations?

[Laurie Pushor]

The Deloitte report contained, in my way of interpreting the opportunities to strengthen and improve our processes, some 27 proposed areas we could work at. It divides into some pretty straightforward areas, communication being one of the most essential.

As we look at understanding what incidents matter to communities, that will be an important part of helping to build some guidance so that we can understand in a more fulsome way what ones they want immediate notification on versus what ones might be better housed in a much more accessible incident information platform. We'll work through those criteria with communities.

The other important part is that we really want to build strong and healthy relationships with communities, so we've been communicating on a weekly basis in the northeast. We've been tasking our engagement specialists across the province with making sure they're out and about and meeting the people who are interested, and have an interest, in knowing about the work we do and the work the industry is doing. We will continue to build those relationships and to make sure we have methods and procedures to provide them with the information they want to have. In the end, they can have access in a full, transparent way to all our information in that area.

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

In the report, Deloitte gave you a list of 27 things to do, so to speak.

Can you give us an idea of how many of those 27 items you've started, how many you've completed and how many of them are ongoing?

[Laurie Pushor]

Very consistent with an audit, we've tasked a team with building a work plan to attend to all those things. That work plan is all but done. It's being reviewed by Deloitte right now, the same as an auditor would, to see if they believe it meets their expectations.

In the meantime, we've done a lot of this work on an interim basis, so we believe we have a lot of foundational work in place. Unlike many others, this response or this work plan will be managed out of the CEO's office to ensure that, across the AER, there's no misunderstanding about the urgency and importance of getting this work done.

I would expect the vast majority of that work to be completed over the course of 2024. We have also said it shall not be a “do everything before you implement anything”. As I said, we have a number of things that we've implemented on an interim basis. As we complete work, we will formalize and implement them and really build that culture of continuous engagement and continuous improvement.

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

In response to an earlier question, you referred to the joint oil sands monitoring between the Alberta Energy Regulator and Environment and Climate Change Canada.

Can you speak to any changes that have been made on the federal government side by Environment and Climate Change Canada?

[Laurie Pushor]

I'm sorry if I misrepresented things.

The collaboration I'm referring to is actually between Alberta Environment and Protected Areas, Environment and Climate Change Canada, industry and local communities. On an annual basis, they build a program of monitoring and investigations they are interested in doing.

I'm not aware of what Environment and Climate Change Canada has or hasn't done in regard to their communications protocols. I know there was talk of the EDGE notification system and so on. I'm not familiar with any updates that have happened there.

[Michael Kram, Conservative, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Can you elaborate on the way the Alberta Energy Regulator and Environment and Climate Change Canada co-operate and collaborate with each other when an incident like this happens?