Fish death in oil patch
By GABRIEL ZARATE, SRJ Reporter 02.JUL.08
Alberta Environment is investigating an unexplained fish die-off in a reservoir in the Athabasca oil patch. The reservoir was built in the 1970s to divert the waters of Beaver Creek away from a nearby Syncrude oil sands mine, which is no longer active.
“There is no evidence that the incident was caused by contamination from that site,” said Alberta Environment spokesperson Cheryl Robb.
Staff from Environment Alberta and Sustainable Resource Development have been at the site, and have taken samples of the water and local fish.
The reservoir feeds into Poplar Creek, which in turn drains into the Athabasca River.
The nearest industry is a Suncor construction site 400 metres away. This is an expansion of Suncor’s upgrader, but at this point it does not involve oil sands processing.
The fish in question are all small, fathead minors and broad stickleback. The manmade reservoir is not a natural fish habitat, nor is it stocked or used for sport fishing.
Robb explained there are several possible reasons for the die-off such as a disease or illegal dumping from the bridge across the reservoir. But she said it was all speculation at this point until the investigation produces results.
Robb said Alberta Environment was doing everything necessary to protect the public. She pointed to a June 15 oil leakage into the Red Deer River and Gleniffer Lake north of Calgary, when Alberta Environment crews used booms to isolate the spill on the lake’s surface, clearly an incident where industrial contamination occurred in a natural environment.
Alberta’s laws allows up to two years for environmental investigations. This is supposed to give Alberta Environment time to properly assemble evidence in case legal action is needed.
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