By: Leslie Romero
With the successful growth of the Athabasca soil sands industry, there is no doubt concerns have risen. This area contains the largest deposits of bitumen or extremely heavy crude oil estimated to be equivalent to 170 billion barrels of crude oil! These concerns are in regard to the possible contamination of nearby fresh water sources, specifically the Athabasca River. Some of the Athabasca river tributaries flow towards the direction of major oil sand surfaces. Thus, studies have been conducted to analyze for any potential contaminants these fresh water sources may be receiving from adjacent oil sands (Sun et al., 2017). From these studies, it was concluded that Naphthenic acids were found at very high concentration in natural water north of the industry, as well as elevated levels in groundwater. Bitumen-derived organics were also found only on surface water. This study can be taken into consideration of the future environmental impacts soil sand industry could cause if there are no regulations. Consequently, further focus should be directed into monitoring of seepage into tributaries.
With the successful growth of the Athabasca soil sands industry, there is no doubt concerns have risen. This area contains the largest deposits of bitumen or extremely heavy crude oil estimated to be equivalent to 170 billion barrels of crude oil! These concerns are in regard to the possible contamination of nearby fresh water sources, specifically the Athabasca River. Some of the Athabasca river tributaries flow towards the direction of major oil sand surfaces. Thus, studies have been conducted to analyze for any potential contaminants these fresh water sources may be receiving from adjacent oil sands (Sun et al., 2017). From these studies, it was concluded that Naphthenic acids were found at very high concentration in natural water north of the industry, as well as elevated levels in groundwater. Bitumen-derived organics were also found only on surface water. This study can be taken into consideration of the future environmental impacts soil sand industry could cause if there are no regulations. Consequently, further focus should be directed into monitoring of seepage into tributaries.
Chenxing Sun, William Shotyk, Chad W. Cuss, Mark W. Donner, Jon Fennell, Muhammad Javed, Tommy Noernberg, Mark Poesch, Rick Pelletier, Nilo Sinnatamby, Tariq Siddique, and Jonathan W. Martin.
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