HAZMAT Magazine -- No environmental enforcement at Tar Sands, group says
July 23rd, 2008ForestEthics is calling on the federal and Alberta governments to clean up the Tar Sands and enforce environmental regulation.
Oil companies operating in the Tar Sands were fined only $249,000 in
2006, despite numerous environmental violations including 240 air
quality exceedances by just one company. By comparison, library fines
for Alberta's largest cities, Calgary and Edmonton, totaled more than
$4 million that same year, in 2006, or 16 times more than what all the
oil companies were fined for their environmental violations.
"Government and industry are saying the Tar Sands are controlled by
strict environmental standards, but the government's own records show
that's clearly not the case," says Gillian McEachern, senior campaigner
with ForestEthics.
ForestEthics says Alberta environmental enforcement records for 2007
show Alberta issued two Environmental Protection Orders against
Syncrude and Suncor and one Environmental Enforcement Order against
Suncor. None were prosecuted or fined. In 2005, Alberta issued one
Environmental Protection Order to Syncrude and one warning letter to
Devon and Suncor. However, that same year Suncor had 30 air quality
exceedances and showed an increasing trend of 240 air quality
exceedances and greater volume of spills and leaks in 2006, but none
were fined or prosecuted.
Federal environmental regulation covering oil companies operating in
the Tar Sands fares no better, ForestEthics says. Not one charge has
been laid against an oil sands company operating in the Tar Sands under
the Fisheries Act between 1988 and 2005, despite production now
exceeding 1.3 million barrels per day.
"The Federal and Alberta governments either lack the capacity or are
willfully ignoring the need to enforce environmental laws in the Tar
Sands," says McEachern. "The Tar Sands look more and more like a safe
haven for the world's largest and most profitable oil companies to do
as they please."
