A third-party review of the Alberta Energy Regulator’s (AER) handling of a months-long toxic tailings leak at Imperial Oil’s Kearl oil sands mine has highlighted the need for clearer communication.
Imperial, a unit of Exxon Mobil, first spotted discolored water pooling near its Kearl site in May last year. The company informed the AER and local Indigenous communities, but failed to tell those communities the water contained tailings until February, after a second leak.
Tailings, a toxic mining by-product containing water, silt, residual bitumen and metals, seeped from the site, angering local Indigenous communities who hunt and fish on the lands downstream from Canada’s oil sands mines.
The review by Deloitte noted that while the AER followed internal standards and processes, the Kearl incident highlighted the need for “clearer communication protocols with Indigenous People and external stakeholders”.
“(The) review has identified opportunities for improvement that will… streamline the AER’s governance system for incident and emergency management,” according to the report.
Canada’s federal environment ministry in May had opened a formal investigation into the tailings leak.
“This review highlights the urgent need for the federal government to use the tools at its disposal to step in and address the issue of toxic tailings,” Aliénor Rougeot, climate and energy program manager at advocacy group Environmental Defence Canada, said on Wednesday.
(Reporting by Seher Dareen in Bengaluru)