Alberta First Nation angry at Imperial's silence while tailings pond leaked for 9 months
CBC
A northern Alberta Indigenous leader has accused Imperial Oil Ltd. of a nine-month coverup over a massive release of toxic oilsands tailings on land near where his band harvests food.
Chief Allan Adam of the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation said Thursday that Imperial executives had several chances to tell him in person about the leak after it was discovered in May 2022.
He learned about it after the province's energy regulator issued an environmental protection order on Feb. 6.
"During that nine-month period, ACFN had many meetings with them, including a sit-down, face-to-face between myself and the vice-president in November," Adam told reporters Thursday. "Each meeting was an opportunity where they could have come clean, but they chose to hide the fact from us over and over again."
Imperial expressed regret over the communication and said it won't happen again.
"We have expressed to (Chief Adam) directly our regret that our communications did not meet the expectations of the (Athabasca Chipewyan) community," said a Thursday statement from Jamie Long, Imperial's vice-president of mining.
"We further committed to him that we are taking the necessary steps to improve our communications so this does not happen again in the future."
Imperial employees first reported in May that seepage was escaping from a tailings pond and making its way to the surface. The company confirmed the seepage was tailings wastewater that made its way through a fill layer.
The unknown quantity of wastewater exceeds federal and provincial guidelines for iron, arsenic, sulphates and hydrocarbons that could include kerosene, creosote and diesel. The seepage has continued.
In addition, 5.3 million litres of water escaped from a catchment meant to capture escaped tailings. That makes it, on its own, one of the largest spills in Alberta history.
The tailings leaked onto muskeg and forest as well as a small lake and tributaries of the Firebag and Muskeg rivers.
"How many more tailings leaks are taking place right now?" Allan asked.
No public notification was made of the two releases until the Alberta Energy Regulator issued the environmental protection order. By then, says Adam, his people had been sharing and eating food harvested from adjacent lands for months.
"We have land users in the area that hunt and fish animals that could have been exposed to these deadly toxins. We have been eating them for months unaware of the potential danger."