Running out of Steam?

Oil Sands Development and Water Use in the Athabasca River-Watershed: Science and Market based Solutions (REPORT) May 2007 -- Alberta’s oil sands (174 billion barrels) are not only the world’s largest capital project but now represent 60 per cent of the world’s investable oil reserves. But to produce one million barrels of oil a day, industry requires withdrawals of enough water from the Athabasca River to sustain a city of two million people every year. Despite some recycling, the majority of this water never returns to the river and is pumped into some of the world’s largest man-made dykes containing toxic waste.

During the past year a variety of industry and government agencies have recognized that the intensive water requirements of unconventional oil, combined with climate change, may threaten the water security of two northern territories, 300,000 aboriginal people and Canada’s largest watershed: the Mackenzie River Basin. The Petroleum Technology Alliance Canada, for example, recently stated that its “largest concern” in the oil sands was water use and reuse because “bitumen production can be much more fresh water intensive than other oil production operations.”

A 2006 Alberta report (Investing In Our Future) noted that “over the long term the Athabasca River may not have sufficient flows to meet the needs of all the planned mining operations and maintain adequate stream flows.” The report also concluded that Alberta Environment had failed “to provide timely advice and direction” on water use. The National Energy Board has questioned the sustainability of water withdrawals, while the Department of Fisheries and Oceans now reports that the cumulative effects of water withdrawals “could not be predicted with confidence." In addition, the World Wildlife Fund predicts that warming temperatures will significantly reduce both water quality and quantity in the region. By 2015, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers predicts that oil sands production may total as much as three million barrels a day. At that point it will be too late to address the impacts of rapid energy development on water scarcity or to responsibly consider options.

To address these critical issues, the University of Alberta’s Environmental Research and Studies Centre (ERSC) and the University of Toronto’s Program on Water Issues (POWI) at the Munk Centre for International Studies recently asked two prominent scholars to assess the implications of current and planned water withdrawals from the Athabasca River and options for water management.

Their papers suggest that the time for critical decision-making has arrived; that energy production and the fate of water resources are inexorably linked and that innovative alternatives to business as usual are still possible.

For the entire report visit http://www.ualberta.ca/~ersc/water.pdf