Efforts to investigate damage from contaminated wastewater onto Indigenous lands in Alberta are crucial, but won’t undo the years of damage from weak enforcement of Canada’s environmental laws.
When the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) announced Imperial Oil had to pay a $50,000 administrative penalty, it said this was the maximum base amount allowed under the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act. This is "absolutely not" accurate, according to experts.
The Alberta Energy Regulator's $50,000 fine for Imperial Oil for tailings leaks at one of its oilsands facilities is a paltry measure in the face of its massive profits, according to several critics.
More than three decades after Indigenous leaders in northern Alberta began asking for funding to better understand if pollution from the oilsands was making their people sick, the federal government is funding a study to do just that.
Oil and gas companies are making record breaking profits, but failing to invest in meaningful decarbonization. On Thursday, the House of Commons environment committee took their executives to task.
The Pathways Alliance represents the titans of Canada's oil and gas industry, and according to a leading international think tank, the group is using a three-step greenwashing strategy aimed at extracting tax dollars and delaying climate action.
The federal government will assess the toxicity of a harmful compound in oilsands tailings after the Athabasca Chipewyan First Nation and environmental groups requested a review.
As Brad Corson was grilled at the federal environment committee for a second time, the CEO of Imperial Oil continued to insist a massive tailings leak in northern Alberta did not harm drinking water or wildlife.
"They're private sector entities for whom their priority is to do what's best for their business. And that doesn't make them evil, but it does mean they don't belong here.”
Alberta's New Democrat Opposition and a prominent First Nations leader are calling for a review of the province's energy regulator to be held in public, with public input.
A federal committee is forcing the president of the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) to testify for a second time on the aftermath of huge tailings pond leaks at Imperial Oil's Kearl facility earlier this year.