Regulator OKs oilsands tailings plan
CALGARY — Alberta’s energy regulator has approved an oilsands giant’s plans to manage its vast tailings ponds despite ongoing concerns about their reliability.
“[Opponents] raised concerns with the aquatic closure outcome and uncertainties with the proposed technology,” Alberta Energy Regulator said in its decision on Suncor Energy’s Millennium mine. “The [regulator] shares those concerns.”
While the regulator has added a series of reporting and monitoring requirements, the decision approves substantially the same plan it turned down last spring.
The plan still relies on so-called end-pit lakes, in which treated tailings are pumped to the bottom of an engineered basin and capped with fresh water. The technology has often been used for other mines, but never for oilsands tailings. It also proposes a reclamation timeline which will require some sort of monitoring well into the next century.
“Those core issues were not addressed and they’ve kind of just evaporated now,” said Jodi McNeill of the Pembina Institute, a clean energy think-tank.
The regulator said in its ruling that the Suncor decision is not to be considered a precedent. But plans from seven other projects from six producers are being reviewed and McNeill said most of them have the same problems as Suncor. “It ultimately is [a precedent],” she said.
The Millennium tailings pond holds more than 300 billion litres of water contaminated with toxins including bitumen, naphthenic acids, cyanide and heavy metals.
The approval sets a number of reporting requirements to ensure Suncor meets deadlines.
Suncor has until 2024 to clean up all 314 billion litres of tailings produced before 2015. By that time, the mine will have produced another 281 billion litres of tailings. That total must decline to 147 billion litres by 2033, when the mine is scheduled to close.
All tailings must be gone by 2043, with ongoing monitoring to ensure the site remains stable and develops a healthy ecosystem.
“There are risks that Suncor will not achieve this profile,” the regulator said. “The ability of Suncor to achieve the profile is dependent on successfully implementing its [tailings management plan].”