AER to probe Nexen pipeline spill
A day after acknowledging an increase in the number of pipeline failures, the Alberta Energy Regulator is now investigating one of the biggest ruptures in the province in years.
Oilsands producer Nexen is estimating more than 31,000 barrels of emulsion — a mixture of briny water, bitumen and sand — spilled in the muskeg at its Long Lake operations east of Fort McMurray on Wednesday before the flow was halted.
The cleanup and an investigation by the AER is underway.
The Nexen spill was discovered just as the regulator was releasing its 2014- 15 annual report that revealed the number of pipeline “incidents” in Alberta rose 15 per cent last year despite the AER’s well- publicized efforts to reduce ruptures and spills.
The report counted 773 pipeline “incidents” in the province in 2014 compared with 658 in 2013, but other AER documents reveal the volumes spilled last year declined more than 50 per cent from the previous year despite the increase in the number of incidents.
The AER defines “incidents” as reportable releases of hydrogen sulphide, hydrocarbons or produced water and any release that affects a body of water.
The volume of produced ( salty) water that spilled from the network of pipelines declined from almost 125,000 barrels in 2013 to 55,000 barrels in 2014, while the volume of hydrocarbons that spilled fell from 7,875 barrels in 2013 to 3,786 barrels in 2014, according to the AER.
The AER report noted “while the overall incident rate was up, most of that increase were smaller incidents with limited environmental impacts; there were fewer large pipeline releases.”
Until now, that is.
Nexen’s Long Lake spill is more than half the total volume of produced water and hydrocarbons spilled in the province in 2014. Greenpeace Canada said Thursday the spill is “a good reminder that Alberta has a long way to go to address its pipeline problems.”
In its report, the AER noted the number of pipeline incidents increased to 1.6 per 1,000 kilometres of pipeline in 2014, from 1.4 in the previous year.
The AER has targeted a four per cent decrease in the overall number of pipeline “incidents” from 2014 to 2017.
The AER regulates 933 companies operating more than 421,000 kilometres of natural gas, crude oil and other pipelines. The network transported most of the $ 110 billion in petroleum produced in 2014 in the province and accounts for almost 80 per cent of the crude oil and gas in Canada.
When a pipeline operated by Plains Midstream Canada ruptured and spilled 28,000 barrels of crude oil near a First Nations community in northwest Alberta in 2011, it was described the largest pipeline spill in the province in 35 years.
In 2013, Apache Corp. spilled 60,000 barrels of produced water near Zama City in northern Alberta.
Following a second high- profile oil spill by Plains into the Red Deer River system in 2012 and a rupture on an Enbridge oil pipeline near Elk Point, the Alberta government launched a review of pipeline safety. That study concluded the industry was generally well- managed but there was a need for more safety at water crossings. In March, the province’s auditor general came out with six more recommendations to improve the AER’s effectiveness around pipeline safety.
With the public criticism, the industry has also made pipeline integrity and safety a priority.
Three months into her tenure as premier and pipeline politics — oil spills to climate change — are already emerging as a defining issue for Notley.
Landowners and environmental groups have long complained the AER — and its predecessor organizations that date to the 1930s — is far too easy on companies that have operational failures. Many were critical earlier this month when the AER issued an administrative penalty of just $ 16,500 to Apache for the 2013 spill that went undetected for weeks.
Alberta NDP Premier Rachel Notley was critical of the regulator’s “pro- industry mandate” as an opposition politician and had promised a “vigorous review” of the AER’s mandate. The new premier has also raised the possibility of reinstalling some functions that were moved to the AER from the Environment Ministry back under direct government oversight.
Three months into her tenure as premier and pipeline politics — oil spills to climate change — are already emerging as a defining issue for Notley.
Even as Notley gets a lesson in the political realities of getting her fellow premiers onside for any new pipelines from the oilsands at the Council of the Federation in St. John’s, N. L., she also got a reminder of the importance of pipeline concerns back home.
It’s a mess on both fronts and — on seemingly every level — it will take a lot of hard work to clean up.