First Nations want oilsands tailings component to be declared toxin

Article content material

Two Alberta First Nations have requested the federal authorities to look at whether or not a part of oilsands tailings pond water identified to hurt fish and different animals must be classed as poisonous.

The transfer may pressure a long-awaited human well being examine into growth impacts, deliver the trade beneath new laws and have an effect on its means to launch handled wastewater.

Article content material

Article content material

“There are massive gaps in science on the human well being facet,” stated Bronwyn Roe, lawyer for the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation, which makes use of lands adjoining to oilsands growth. “If the ministers do that evaluation, they may create new laws.”

That First Nation’s request is supported by the Mikisew Cree.

“Underneath federal laws . . . fish have extra rights than people,” it wrote in a March 11 letter to federal Surroundings Minister Steven Guilbeault. “The federal government of Canada can not watch for extra analysis to make this evaluation.”

The 2 nations are involved about naphthenic acids, present in tailings and different oilsands wastewater. Peer-reviewed analysis has discovered the complicated hydrocarbons are poisonous to fish, have an effect on hormone perform in people and different mammals, and could also be carcinogenic.

Oilsands producers are required to report releases of these chemical substances. However allowable limits for his or her presence in floor or groundwater are tips, not laws.

In January, Surroundings and Local weather Change Canada and Well being Canada launched a report that concluded naphthenic acids shouldn’t be labeled as poisonous. Nonetheless, that report solely handled commercially produced variations, not these present in tailings.

Article content material

Article content material

“(Oilsands) naphthenic acids differ in supply, composition, properties and use in comparison with industrial naphthenic acids,” the report says.

The First Nations are utilizing latest adjustments to the Canadian Environmental Safety Act to request Guilbeault assessment that January discovering. A assessment would come with analysis into the well being results of oilsands naphthenic acids each on their very own and along side different chemical substances — a long-standing aim of each the Athabasca Chipewyan and Mikisew.

“An enormous piece is that human well being examine,” stated Roe. “They’ve been asking for that for years.

“They need higher research of the human well being impacts of oilsands operations, together with releases from tailings ponds.”

A ruling that naphthenic acids must be thought-about a toxin would additionally have an effect on laws governing the substances, Roe stated.

“As soon as the affect on human well being is best understood, I feel the federal government will likely be compelled to take motion to mitigate the human well being results and the environmental results.”

Guidelines anticipated quickly to permit launch of handled tailings pond water

Article content material

Roe notes the discovering may have an effect on plans to launch handled tailings pond water into the Athabasca River. Trade and the federal authorities are presently growing guidelines that will govern how water from these ponds could be handled and launched into the river.

These laws are anticipated in 2025. Roe stated classifying naphthenic acids as poisonous may have an effect on these plans.

“It will affect tailings pond administration,” she stated.

Kendall Dilling, president of the oilsands trade group Pathways Alliance, stated additional analysis on naphthenic acids is underway.

“We respect the leaders’ want to hunt data for the well being of their group,” he stated in an e-mail. “We are going to proceed to co-operate with authorities ought to extra analysis be superior in response to this request.”

A spokesman for Surroundings and Local weather Change Canada stated Guilbeault and Well being Minister Mark Holland are contemplating the request. The division is conducting additional research on naphthenic acids.

Oilsands tailings ponds now retailer about 1.4 trillion litres of water, or 1.4 cubic kilometres. Some proof suggests the water has already entered the atmosphere.

Article content material

A 2017 report from the environmental watchdog of the North American free commerce deal discovered “scientifically legitimate” proof that tailings have escaped the ponds, though not the oilsands leases. That discovering is echoed by latest groundwater reviews from trade.

That seepage could now be off lease.

Alberta’s Oilsands Monitoring Program reveals a typical proxy for oilsands residue at a sampling station within the Muskeg River started climbing drastically in March 2022 and was 18 occasions greater than the 2021 common inside a 12 months.

Guilbeault and Holland have till June 7 to reply to the First Nations’ requests.

Article content material