‘Conservative’ estimate based on industry data
Every day more than 11 million litres of contaminated water leak into the ground from the toxic tailings ponds in the oilsands of northern Alberta according to a new report from Environmental Defence.
The report’s findings calculated using leakage estimates from companies’ environmental impact assessments are at odds with government and industry assurances that the toxic water doesn’t leak into groundwater. “This is untrue” says the report. “Virtually everyone close to the tar sands industry knows that all tar sands tailings ponds leak — even the new ones — and that while steps are taken to recapture the leakage a significant portion of contaminated water still escapes into the environment.”
Environmental Defence says its estimate of 4 billion litres of leakage per year is conservative. “We totally admit that this is an estimate but it’s an estimate based on actual industry information” says Matt Price a project manager with the organization.
The report also points out that Alberta Environment expects industry to self-monitor its own leakage. If proposed projects keep their schedules the leakage rate will multiply five times by 2012 to 72 million litres a day according to the report. “Anyone who is familiar with the scale of the tailings ponds I don’t think would find this shocking at all” says Price.
