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September 2010

Vol. 15, No. 37 Week of September 12, 2010

A fog over the oil sands

‘Boycotters’ setting record straight; insist they only want to reduce high-carbon fuels; study fingers oil sands for toxic metals

Gary Park

For Petroleum News

The battle for hearts, minds and credibility is raging in the Alberta oil sands like seldom, if ever, before.

Claims by ForestEthics, a U.S. activist environmental group, that it had gathered support from some major U.S. retailers to boycott the use of fuel derived from the oil sands are being eroded, but that dispute has been overshadowed by a scientific report accusing oil sands operators of raising levels of toxins in the Athabasca River, the main waterway in northeastern Alberta.

These two events have raised questions about who is to be believed.

ForestEthics was quick to take credit for persuading four Fortune 500 companies — Gap, Timberland, Levi Strauss and Walgreens — to cut off any connections with the oil sands.

Three of the four, all with hundreds of millions of dollars at stake in the Canadian market, were just as quick to distance themselves from talk of a boycott.

Gap denies boycott

Gap issued a release to its customers, declaring it was “not true” that it had initiated an oil sands-related boycott.

The company said it had simply “asked” shipping firms “what they are doing to eliminate high-carbon intensive fuels,” which covered a full range of sources, including the oil sands.

A Gap spokesman said it was making a “standard request for information … (and did not anticipate) taking any further action.”

Similarly, Timberland said it was asking shipping companies what steps they were taking to avoid “carbon-intensive sources like Canada’s tar sands.”

Its website posting, entitled “Reducing Emissions — Not Boycotting Fuel,” said Timberland did not believe boycotts “are the best path towards collaborative problem solving or positive sustainable outcomes.”

Levi Strauss, by way of setting the record straight, said it supported the “development and use of clean and renewable fuel sources,” but it had not taken a position “opposing or supporting any fuel or energy source from Canada.”

Instead, it had decided to “give preference to low-carbon fuels” in choosing its transportation contractors, while informing ForestEthics it would “not dictate how our suppliers achieve that goal.”

Walgreens, which has no outlets in Canada, said it had “very little exposure to tar sands fuel to start with.”

A spokeswoman for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers said ForestEthics apparently wanted to “act as the Fortune 500 judge, jury and spokesperson. Unfortunately, accuracy and ethics are not their strong suit.”

Earlier this year, ForestEthics said it had persuaded Bed Bath and Beyond and Whole Foods to shun oil sands-sourced products. Bed Bath and Beyond later said it was only asking its contractors to “give preference to fuels with lower greenhouse gas footprints where feasible.”

Toxin source questioned

With that issue twisting and turning, scientists from the University of Alberta, Queen’s University in Ontario and Alaska-based Oceana published new research in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, challenging claims by the Alberta government that toxins in the Athabasca River and related watersheds occur naturally.

David Schindler, a study author and University of Alberta ecologist, said the findings put pressure on the government to stop oil sands expansions until the problems are solved and the Canadian government’s environment department takes responsibility for monitoring the Athabasca.

Toxic concentrations in seven elements exceed those recommended by the Alberta and Canadian governments for the protection of aquatic life, the study said, concluding that the oil sands industry “substantially increases loadings” of toxins in the river.

Schindler said the results are especially troubling for three metals — mercury, arsenic and lead.

“The levels stay high and some of that may be due to natural sources, but the big inputs are right around (oil sands) developments,” he said.

He said the incidence of pollutants in fish is particularly troublesome because local aboriginal communities depend on the region’s fishery for food.

Schindler said it should be simple for oil sands operators to reduce airborne pollutants, using technology that is available to cut greenhouse gas emissions, while more stringent regulations are needed for water.

Government committed to tracking

Canada’s Environment Minister Jim Prentice said in a statement that the federal government is committed to tracking the presence of chemicals using a new fingerprinting program that can identify whether chemicals produced as a byproduct of oil sands operations are seeping into the surrounding environment. The Alberta government said it will review the study before commenting.

Schindler said the study was designed to test claims made in 2009 by the Regional Aquatic Monitoring Program, a joint industry-government agency, that the Athabasca’s water quality is similar to conditions that prevailed before oil sands development.

The study said its findings prove “the serious defects” of the RAMP findings, adding that detailed monitoring and the ability to pinpoint the sources of contaminants is “essential” to control the potential impact on human health.

Schindler said the levels of pollutants found by the study were easily measurable and “any program that cannot detect these levels has to be considered incompetent.”

RAMP spokesman Fred Kuzmic told reporters that Schindler turned down an offer to become one of eight participants in a peer review of RAMP’s monitoring practices.

He said RAMP studies show there are higher concentrations of pollutants closer to oil sands operations, “but that’s not unexpected because the rivers run through the oil sands deposits.”

Shell using new technology

The study was released four days after Royal Dutch Shell launched a commercial-scale demonstration plant in Alberta using a new technology it predicts will speed the cleanup of tailings ponds which hold toxic wastes from oil sands extraction and refining.

John Broadhurst, Shell Canada’s vice president of heavy oil development, said the resulting technical data will be made available to anyone, “no strings attached, no intellectual property, no expectation of money.”

The technology, developed at a cost of C$30 million (US$28 million), is designed to turn oil sands tailings into solid oil. Shell Canada said it expects the new plant will initially process 1 percent to 20 percent of its fine tailings.

Of the other oil sands producers, Suncor Energy is the only operator pledged to meet an Alberta government directive for companies to dry out 50 percent of their fine tailings by 2013.

Imperial Oil was granted approval in August for a cleanup plan at the Syncrude Canada operation that will not meet the target until 2018 and Shell’s plan has yet to be approved.

The Pembina Institute and Water Matters have urged the Alberta Energy Resources Conservation Board to rescind its Syncrude decision, arguing the 2013 target was “pretty mandatory” not a guideline.

An ERCB spokesman said Syncrude was “doing everything that is technologically doable to meet the directive as quickly as possible.”






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