The oilsands industry boosts levels of toxins such as mercury and arsenic in the Athabasca River by up to eight times, says a new study.
University of Alberta biologists David Schindler and Erin Kelly published a report Monday on the effects of oilsands development on the Athabasca watershed. The report examines 13 toxic elements monitored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The report found that winter levels of chromium, mercury, nickel and silver were up to eight times higher in samples collected immediately downstream of tailings ponds and other oilsands industrial sites than levels recorded upstream of those sites. Summer levels of antimony, arsenic, copper and lead were up to four times higher.
Industry and the province have long claimed that these pollutants were natural, said Schindler, but this study shows otherwise.
"You might haggle about whether the numbers are high enough to be of concern to human or animal health, but certainly the data clearly shows that the Fisheries Act is being violated."
Pollutants studied
Schindler's team took water and snow samples from in and around the Athabasca River in 2008.
Previous studies have found that most of the contaminants in the Athabasca River were from natural sources, said Fred Kuzmic, biologist and spokesperson for the Regional Aquatics Monitoring Program (RAMP), the industry-government group that tracks water pollution in the oilsands region.
"We know the river in the region runs through the oilsands deposit," he said, so it's likely that some of these pollutants are from that deposit. "We're not seeing any difference between upstream and downstream levels."
Schindler said his team was careful to pick sites outside of the oilsands region and upstream of industry to measure background levels of contaminants.
Contaminant concentrations were consistently above background levels when industry was present, Schindler said. "The highest values were always right around industrial development," he said, and values decreased as you moved away from it. A study published by the team last December found similar results for organic pollutants.
If most of the contamination came from nature, Schindler noted, you'd expect concentrations to increase, not decrease, as you moved down river. "Industry itself has reported to put out hundreds of kilograms of these [pollutants]," he noted, referring to the federal National Pollutant Release Inventory. "Any program that claims it can't detect them is a poorly designed program."
RAMP criticized
While none of the pollutants in the study broke federal or provincial guidelines for drinking water, Schindler said, a few, including mercury, lead, copper and cadmium, broke guidelines for the protection of aquatic life.
Residents are already warned not to eat too much walleye due to high mercury levels, Schindler said, and this suggests industry may be pushing those levels even higher. He hoped Health Canada would do a more detailed study on the region's animals and vegetation to see if pollution was affecting the food chain.
It's tough to distinguish between natural and industrial pollution in the Athabasca River, said Jessica Potter, spokesperson for Alberta Environment, but industry is definitely having some effect on the Athabasca. The province is now studying the river to find out the amount of pollution that can be linked to industry.
Schindler criticized RAMP as amateurish and unprofessional, noting that it did not submit its studies for peer review prior to publication as other researchers do. RAMP itself is reviewed by outside researchers every few years. "It's high time Environment Canada took over the monitoring," he said.
The report is available in this week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
