The Syncrude upgrader and tailing ponds picture is on the cover of the weekend Globe, along with a headline covering a full third of the page. By the time I had finished reading the articles, beauty or no, I was feeling nauseous and angry.
Looking at and walking through clearcut is gut wrenching but you're comforted, however meagerly, by the sight of tree planters, vestiges of arable land and the sounds of animal life. The oil sands is an order of magnitude more disturbing. Six meters of soil and vegetation termed "overburden" is effectively stripped off the land, and this as far as the eye can see. Various carbon sequestration strategies and other mitigation technologies will probably serve to assuage our guilt and reduce our footprint in the coming years but it's hard to imagine this land being fit for anything other than desertification when we're done.
my father is working on one of these projects in Fort McMurray, Alberta, and raised a few good arguments. I linked him to this post and asked him what he thought. he said that he couldn't argue with you that the land is not very attractive, but when I asked what it was like before, he said that it was something that wasn't much better.
I don't think I can get into the technical information about HOW his project is extracting the oil, but he assured me that it leaves minimal damage to the surface and the environment. Mining is going to leave more damage, but he said that Syncrude and Suncor are really doing their part to leave minimal negative effects on the land/environment. remember, he lives this every day. he sees this first hand. he is an environmental engineer and I trust what he has to say.
Canada has pretty strict laws and regulations on the rejuvenation of the land post extraction. I was born and raised in Alberta and I can tell you that it is a beautiful place and will always be a beautiful place. we respect our land and have no desire to ruin it.
if these images bothers you, why don't you try demanding less oil instead of complaining about what it is doing to the environment? the only reason it is being extracted is due to our gluttony/overuse.
my father wondered where all the concern was for the environment when mining USELESS things like diamonds? at least these people are rejuvenating the land instead of leaving gaping wounds for nature to heal.
there is plenty more to talk about, but I'll wait until I get some response.
it is interesting to be stuck in the middle on this.
I always wondered if this fossil fuel is so costly (see the massive profits the oil companies tout - to their investors anyway) why can't they spend the money on digging under the dirt and preserving the surface? I'm not picking on this company in particular, its not just this, but also the devastating coal mining practices in W. Va and elsewhere.
And yes, this question is rhetorical. Children having clean water tomorrow is always going to lose out to chairman's new lamborghini now every time.
the process that my father helped refine/design barely does anything to the surface (and the environment)! it is not mining and is pretty ingenious. props dad.
i think scan`s comment has to be the key to make real changes in our enviroment, the problem is not only the source of all our energy, but the excesive use of it. take for instance Las Vegas.. some architect made a book about what we should learn from it... if we make an update, we should learn what NOT to do, Las Vegas is the kingdom of excess, irracionality and total and absolute waste. now its Alberta, tomorrow the us is coming for all of latin america`s soil richness arguing that biodiesel is ecological, such a lie!!!
stop wasting energy, just turn off the computer and read a book!!!!
...ok!
I'll go read a book with paper made from forest, and the ink and cover made from petroleum products, all which was wrapped in more plastic, and shipped from a warehouse thousands of miles away.
Good thing reading books will save me from using energy.
regardless of what we do, we are going to consume energy.
to comment on Leo's earlier statement:
I think that the refining of the sand oil is about the most productive of all the ways to process crude oil. it is not an entire waste.
scan - you can blame our demand for oil all you want, but the same defense has been put forth by every industry in the past 100 years - don't blame me for all those mangled workers and dead from unsafe cars, the public demands our products. Those excuses lack validity now, just like they always have.
I'm glad your dad is paving the way to mine for oil that minimally impacts the environment, but looking at the photos linked from here, I have to say I highly doubt what you're saying. We pay a lot of money to these companies who control the oil, what I am saying is that they are leveraging today's massive profits on tommorows massive costs to clean up their mess and the damage it causes.
Otherwise its like saying that since nobody tried to help someone who was shot, we shouldn't prosecute the guy who shot him, because really, isn't society to blame in that case?
I appreciate you taking the time to comment scan(adian). It’s a rare thing to have access to an actual witness on the ground, not to mention the obvious advantage of having your father’s environmental engineering perspective shedding light on the possible factual errors that may be reported in the Globe’s coverage.
First of all I question whether parts of the native population surrounding the epicentre of the oil sands project would agree with your father’s assessment “that it was something that wasn't much better” before. Increased cancer rates notwithstanding(controversial at best), there is more to the notion of land than its intrinsic(monetary) or aesthetic value.
But putting aside the metaphysical quagmire the above suggests lets look at this quote from the Globe’s lead article which seems to challenge the benign extraction methodology you claim your father is responsible for.
“To mine bitumen, the land must first be cleared and drained. Clumps of sand are shovelled out and then mixed with water and heated, to force the hydrocarbon to rise to the top. It is then processed in an “upgrader” to produce synthetic crude before being sent to a refinery and turned into gasoline and heating oil.
Estimates vary, but environmental groups says it now takes two to four barrels of fresh water from the Athabasca plus 750 cubic feet of natural gas and about two tons of oily sand to produce one barrel of oil. The process produces two to three times the carbon emissions of a conventional oil well and creates toxic waste water, called tailings, that cannot be allowed back in the river.“
For the record, I believe Burtynsky’s photography serves the story admirably but there’s no substitute for appraising the flora and fauna in person. An aerial viewpoint is something of a distorting lens.
As an aside, before the advent of synthetic diamonds the real ones played a significant role in providing the cutting edge, so to speak, for the mineral, oil and gas industries. I find it baffling that an engineer would call their extraction useless.
I've been thinking about what could happen here for a while, and just finished my thesis on the area at large. The landscape's exploitation was an emotional experience I had not imagined, even after staring at google earth and available aerials. It took a few months to move beyond the awe of the statistic and scale of operations, and I think so much of the current discussion current revolves around this awe.
A few things are certain;
1. the Sands will be developed, in full, for the next 40 years or so.
2. the technologies associated will improve.
3. they will make money, and hire thousands.
My questions are:
Big Oil has to replace their divots; how should they do it? What could it yield?
How will these trailer park millionaires live?
Obviously K.Doran is right. He takes a similar position to Alan Berger in Reclaiming. The land is going to be developed for at least as long as it is economically viable (hello carbon-tax). Therefore it is more instructive to think about ways of changing, re-using or re-imagining such post-industrial landscapes.
Nice schoolblog entries..
As an aside. My sister keeps trying to get me to move and work in Calgary/Alberta...
I respect your opinion and it does raise questions that I'll have to ask my dad. I personally haven't read up on much of this because I just don't have the time or energy at the moment. I'm writing/designing my thesis and think that it is a little more important for me at the moment. however, I don't know how the land was before-before (before the british occupation of the americas). I guess speaking for my dad leaves things open ended and unclear (it is honestly my interpretation in the end). when I say before, I mean before they start the process of removing the oil (a year maybe). my father said that the land was nothing more than a similar landscape with moss (at best) exposed at the surface. I cannot make an argument for why there would be an increased rate in cancer. I do wonder however what kind of cancer you speak of (lung, brain, liver, etc.) and whether you speak of it only in terms of the natives or in terms of the rest of the people living in northern Alberta. I say this because lung cancer would lead me to question tobacco use. I know that the majority of the people I knew that worked on the rigs were smokers and as northern Alberta is a heavy mining/rigging area... you get the point. I don't need to get into it about Canadians and drinking and then their livers.
I am Canadian so I feel I can make the comment about the stereotype.
I can assure you that the only process I am familiar with, due to my conversations with my father, does NOT use the process you have suggested. it sounds similar, but the clearing of land does not happen- at least the extremes you've stated.
okay, I may have mis-spoken when I said useless. I think what I was trying to say is that there are products of less necessity being mined for no greater purpose than greed and status: diamonds (ear rings), gold (for your bling), copper (pretty drain pipes), etc. of course, there are good uses of these products and you could easily manipulate the statements into calling them necessities (iron ore for steel and copper for electrical wiring so we can continue to build...). the thing about these products is that they are much easier to recycle and in doing so yields much less of a price tag; a steel beam can be re-used as long as the sag has been calculated into the stresses. unfortunately, oil cannot just be flipped that easy.
I agree that it is not the best argument to just turn it back to the people who demand it. I am only suggesting that before we sit here and criticize people for satisfying a demand, that we look at our lifestyles critically and do our part to create change. what did you do today that consumed energy?
scan(adian),
I've been reading about the oil sands related cancer issue(natives only) for some time now but there doesn't seem to be any conclusive causal link, so far.
This quote might help explain the misunderstanding relating to the extraction technique your father spoke about:
“Of the 77,600 km2 area that includes oil sands, only 20% of [it] is recoverable using surface mining. ...Where technology allows, the remaining 80% of the oil sands extract oil using drilling processes, such as Cyclic steam stimulation (CSS) and Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD) processes.” -- Stephen Hanus(student), Oil Sands Reclamation, University of Alberta
k.doran,
Provocative ideas at work there. Your gfx are exquisite to say the least. This may be one of the few scenarios where a Price-style scheme might just fly, especially if the transience/turnover persists. Alot of what I'm able to make out from your shots looks pretty water intensive however, and this where I have difficulty with your outlook. With three unis BC/AB/Ssk in private/public R&D there's still considerable evidence - as recently as May of 2k7 - to suggest that the water management issue may potentially derail long-term oil sands development. This is without considering Pembina's latest report card.
What I'm most curious about is whether your thesis contains a hydrologic profile...
JB:
yeah, of course there is going to be drilling. they have to get to where the oil is. I think that is far less disgusting and intrusive than the surface removal method (botox vs plastic surgery!). I don't understand whether you think it is a better solution or not? I think that quote is starting to talk about the process I'm familiar with.
I am still skeptical about the cancer in relation to pollution put in the water from these projects. as far as I am aware, there are more than just native people living in the area. I'd maybe be less skeptical if I had evidence that everyone was experiencing a heightened cancer level. I haven't finished reading through the article, but I'll do that here shortly and see if maybe that answers my questions.
something I'm just thinking about:
if matter cannot be created nor destroyed, then steaming the oil below the surface leaves water in the land (since water and oil don't mix). would that water eventually make its way back into our lakes, rivers, oceans? I have no clue, but if it did, I'd say that it would counter an argument for water wastage. maybe? just an idea.
scan, do you know where does the gas and water needed for the project is coming from and what is going to happend with its waste after the extraction? im asking you this because i live in Tucuman, a small province from Argentina and 300 km from here its located the Bajo La Alumbrera mine, wich is about to be the biggest open extraction of minerals pit in the world, they pump the minerals from there to here mixing it whith millions of galons of natural water from Catamarca (the province the mine is located) and filtrate it here, leaving heavy water in our soil. Catamarca is running out of water and the impact of open mining is terrible,in both health of the people and of course the enviroment.
To me the better solution would be one where responsible stewardship is in evidence all along the chain of extraction-distribution. It’s something of a challenge steering clear of hype, spin and dogma where the oil sands is concerned but judging from available material(relatively unbiased) a best practises routine seems far from the norm. Have a look at the Pembina report and the one below for examples.
“…to produce one million barrels of oil a day, industry requires withdrawals of enough water from the Athabasca River to sustain a city of two million people every year. Despite some recycling, the majority of this water never returns to the river and is pumped into some of the world’s largest man-made dykes containing toxic waste.” Excerpt from the preamble Running out of Steam?
Oil Sands Development and Water Use in the Athabasca River-Watershed: Science
and Market based Solutions – U of T & U of Alberta, 2007
I get where you’re going with the “water wastage” point but the issue isn’t entirely about wastewater; it’s also about intensity of use(either water-related or energy/hydrogen use for SAGD) and whether current and future flows are wisely managed by industry and government, irrespective of energy return on investment.
Jan 30, 08 6:56 pm ·
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as beautiful as ed's photos are, we are destroying our home planet.
The Syncrude upgrader and tailing ponds picture is on the cover of the weekend Globe, along with a headline covering a full third of the page. By the time I had finished reading the articles, beauty or no, I was feeling nauseous and angry.
Looking at and walking through clearcut is gut wrenching but you're comforted, however meagerly, by the sight of tree planters, vestiges of arable land and the sounds of animal life. The oil sands is an order of magnitude more disturbing. Six meters of soil and vegetation termed "overburden" is effectively stripped off the land, and this as far as the eye can see. Various carbon sequestration strategies and other mitigation technologies will probably serve to assuage our guilt and reduce our footprint in the coming years but it's hard to imagine this land being fit for anything other than desertification when we're done.
Ughhhh
my father is working on one of these projects in Fort McMurray, Alberta, and raised a few good arguments. I linked him to this post and asked him what he thought. he said that he couldn't argue with you that the land is not very attractive, but when I asked what it was like before, he said that it was something that wasn't much better.
I don't think I can get into the technical information about HOW his project is extracting the oil, but he assured me that it leaves minimal damage to the surface and the environment. Mining is going to leave more damage, but he said that Syncrude and Suncor are really doing their part to leave minimal negative effects on the land/environment. remember, he lives this every day. he sees this first hand. he is an environmental engineer and I trust what he has to say.
Canada has pretty strict laws and regulations on the rejuvenation of the land post extraction. I was born and raised in Alberta and I can tell you that it is a beautiful place and will always be a beautiful place. we respect our land and have no desire to ruin it.
if these images bothers you, why don't you try demanding less oil instead of complaining about what it is doing to the environment? the only reason it is being extracted is due to our gluttony/overuse.
my father wondered where all the concern was for the environment when mining USELESS things like diamonds? at least these people are rejuvenating the land instead of leaving gaping wounds for nature to heal.
there is plenty more to talk about, but I'll wait until I get some response.
it is interesting to be stuck in the middle on this.
I always wondered if this fossil fuel is so costly (see the massive profits the oil companies tout - to their investors anyway) why can't they spend the money on digging under the dirt and preserving the surface? I'm not picking on this company in particular, its not just this, but also the devastating coal mining practices in W. Va and elsewhere.
And yes, this question is rhetorical. Children having clean water tomorrow is always going to lose out to chairman's new lamborghini now every time.
the process that my father helped refine/design barely does anything to the surface (and the environment)! it is not mining and is pretty ingenious. props dad.
demand pays for that guy's Lamborghini.
i think scan`s comment has to be the key to make real changes in our enviroment, the problem is not only the source of all our energy, but the excesive use of it. take for instance Las Vegas.. some architect made a book about what we should learn from it... if we make an update, we should learn what NOT to do, Las Vegas is the kingdom of excess, irracionality and total and absolute waste. now its Alberta, tomorrow the us is coming for all of latin america`s soil richness arguing that biodiesel is ecological, such a lie!!!
stop wasting energy, just turn off the computer and read a book!!!!
...ok!
I'll go read a book with paper made from forest, and the ink and cover made from petroleum products, all which was wrapped in more plastic, and shipped from a warehouse thousands of miles away.
Good thing reading books will save me from using energy.
you are right pants, lets think a bit more about it.
regardless of what we do, we are going to consume energy.
to comment on Leo's earlier statement:
I think that the refining of the sand oil is about the most productive of all the ways to process crude oil. it is not an entire waste.
scan - you can blame our demand for oil all you want, but the same defense has been put forth by every industry in the past 100 years - don't blame me for all those mangled workers and dead from unsafe cars, the public demands our products. Those excuses lack validity now, just like they always have.
I'm glad your dad is paving the way to mine for oil that minimally impacts the environment, but looking at the photos linked from here, I have to say I highly doubt what you're saying. We pay a lot of money to these companies who control the oil, what I am saying is that they are leveraging today's massive profits on tommorows massive costs to clean up their mess and the damage it causes.
Otherwise its like saying that since nobody tried to help someone who was shot, we shouldn't prosecute the guy who shot him, because really, isn't society to blame in that case?
I appreciate you taking the time to comment scan(adian). It’s a rare thing to have access to an actual witness on the ground, not to mention the obvious advantage of having your father’s environmental engineering perspective shedding light on the possible factual errors that may be reported in the Globe’s coverage.
First of all I question whether parts of the native population surrounding the epicentre of the oil sands project would agree with your father’s assessment “that it was something that wasn't much better” before. Increased cancer rates notwithstanding(controversial at best), there is more to the notion of land than its intrinsic(monetary) or aesthetic value.
But putting aside the metaphysical quagmire the above suggests lets look at this quote from the Globe’s lead article which seems to challenge the benign extraction methodology you claim your father is responsible for.
“To mine bitumen, the land must first be cleared and drained. Clumps of sand are shovelled out and then mixed with water and heated, to force the hydrocarbon to rise to the top. It is then processed in an “upgrader” to produce synthetic crude before being sent to a refinery and turned into gasoline and heating oil.
Estimates vary, but environmental groups says it now takes two to four barrels of fresh water from the Athabasca plus 750 cubic feet of natural gas and about two tons of oily sand to produce one barrel of oil. The process produces two to three times the carbon emissions of a conventional oil well and creates toxic waste water, called tailings, that cannot be allowed back in the river.“
For the record, I believe Burtynsky’s photography serves the story admirably but there’s no substitute for appraising the flora and fauna in person. An aerial viewpoint is something of a distorting lens.
As an aside, before the advent of synthetic diamonds the real ones played a significant role in providing the cutting edge, so to speak, for the mineral, oil and gas industries. I find it baffling that an engineer would call their extraction useless.
I've been thinking about what could happen here for a while, and just finished my thesis on the area at large. The landscape's exploitation was an emotional experience I had not imagined, even after staring at google earth and available aerials. It took a few months to move beyond the awe of the statistic and scale of operations, and I think so much of the current discussion current revolves around this awe.
A few things are certain;
1. the Sands will be developed, in full, for the next 40 years or so.
2. the technologies associated will improve.
3. they will make money, and hire thousands.
My questions are:
Big Oil has to replace their divots; how should they do it? What could it yield?
How will these trailer park millionaires live?
This is what it looks like on the ground: http://www.archinect.com/schoolblog/entry.php?id=59119_0_39_10_C309
And some early ideas: http://www.archinect.com/schoolblog/entry.php?id=69623_0_39_0_C309
Obviously K.Doran is right. He takes a similar position to Alan Berger in Reclaiming. The land is going to be developed for at least as long as it is economically viable (hello carbon-tax). Therefore it is more instructive to think about ways of changing, re-using or re-imagining such post-industrial landscapes.
Nice schoolblog entries..
As an aside. My sister keeps trying to get me to move and work in Calgary/Alberta...
I respect your opinion and it does raise questions that I'll have to ask my dad. I personally haven't read up on much of this because I just don't have the time or energy at the moment. I'm writing/designing my thesis and think that it is a little more important for me at the moment. however, I don't know how the land was before-before (before the british occupation of the americas). I guess speaking for my dad leaves things open ended and unclear (it is honestly my interpretation in the end). when I say before, I mean before they start the process of removing the oil (a year maybe). my father said that the land was nothing more than a similar landscape with moss (at best) exposed at the surface. I cannot make an argument for why there would be an increased rate in cancer. I do wonder however what kind of cancer you speak of (lung, brain, liver, etc.) and whether you speak of it only in terms of the natives or in terms of the rest of the people living in northern Alberta. I say this because lung cancer would lead me to question tobacco use. I know that the majority of the people I knew that worked on the rigs were smokers and as northern Alberta is a heavy mining/rigging area... you get the point. I don't need to get into it about Canadians and drinking and then their livers.
I am Canadian so I feel I can make the comment about the stereotype.
I can assure you that the only process I am familiar with, due to my conversations with my father, does NOT use the process you have suggested. it sounds similar, but the clearing of land does not happen- at least the extremes you've stated.
okay, I may have mis-spoken when I said useless. I think what I was trying to say is that there are products of less necessity being mined for no greater purpose than greed and status: diamonds (ear rings), gold (for your bling), copper (pretty drain pipes), etc. of course, there are good uses of these products and you could easily manipulate the statements into calling them necessities (iron ore for steel and copper for electrical wiring so we can continue to build...). the thing about these products is that they are much easier to recycle and in doing so yields much less of a price tag; a steel beam can be re-used as long as the sag has been calculated into the stresses. unfortunately, oil cannot just be flipped that easy.
I agree that it is not the best argument to just turn it back to the people who demand it. I am only suggesting that before we sit here and criticize people for satisfying a demand, that we look at our lifestyles critically and do our part to create change. what did you do today that consumed energy?
scan(adian),
I've been reading about the oil sands related cancer issue(natives only) for some time now but there doesn't seem to be any conclusive causal link, so far.
This quote might help explain the misunderstanding relating to the extraction technique your father spoke about:
“Of the 77,600 km2 area that includes oil sands, only 20% of [it] is recoverable using surface mining. ...Where technology allows, the remaining 80% of the oil sands extract oil using drilling processes, such as Cyclic steam stimulation (CSS) and Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage (SAGD) processes.” -- Stephen Hanus(student), Oil Sands Reclamation, University of Alberta
k.doran,
Provocative ideas at work there. Your gfx are exquisite to say the least. This may be one of the few scenarios where a Price-style scheme might just fly, especially if the transience/turnover persists. Alot of what I'm able to make out from your shots looks pretty water intensive however, and this where I have difficulty with your outlook. With three unis BC/AB/Ssk in private/public R&D there's still considerable evidence - as recently as May of 2k7 - to suggest that the water management issue may potentially derail long-term oil sands development. This is without considering Pembina's latest report card.
What I'm most curious about is whether your thesis contains a hydrologic profile...
JB:
yeah, of course there is going to be drilling. they have to get to where the oil is. I think that is far less disgusting and intrusive than the surface removal method (botox vs plastic surgery!). I don't understand whether you think it is a better solution or not? I think that quote is starting to talk about the process I'm familiar with.
I am still skeptical about the cancer in relation to pollution put in the water from these projects. as far as I am aware, there are more than just native people living in the area. I'd maybe be less skeptical if I had evidence that everyone was experiencing a heightened cancer level. I haven't finished reading through the article, but I'll do that here shortly and see if maybe that answers my questions.
something I'm just thinking about:
if matter cannot be created nor destroyed, then steaming the oil below the surface leaves water in the land (since water and oil don't mix). would that water eventually make its way back into our lakes, rivers, oceans? I have no clue, but if it did, I'd say that it would counter an argument for water wastage. maybe? just an idea.
scan, do you know where does the gas and water needed for the project is coming from and what is going to happend with its waste after the extraction? im asking you this because i live in Tucuman, a small province from Argentina and 300 km from here its located the Bajo La Alumbrera mine, wich is about to be the biggest open extraction of minerals pit in the world, they pump the minerals from there to here mixing it whith millions of galons of natural water from Catamarca (the province the mine is located) and filtrate it here, leaving heavy water in our soil. Catamarca is running out of water and the impact of open mining is terrible,in both health of the people and of course the enviroment.
scan(adian),
To me the better solution would be one where responsible stewardship is in evidence all along the chain of extraction-distribution. It’s something of a challenge steering clear of hype, spin and dogma where the oil sands is concerned but judging from available material(relatively unbiased) a best practises routine seems far from the norm. Have a look at the Pembina report and the one below for examples.
“…to produce one million barrels of oil a day, industry requires withdrawals of enough water from the Athabasca River to sustain a city of two million people every year. Despite some recycling, the majority of this water never returns to the river and is pumped into some of the world’s largest man-made dykes containing toxic waste.” Excerpt from the preamble
Running out of Steam?
Oil Sands Development and Water Use in the Athabasca River-Watershed: Science
and Market based Solutions – U of T & U of Alberta, 2007
I get where you’re going with the “water wastage” point but the issue isn’t entirely about wastewater; it’s also about intensity of use(either water-related or energy/hydrogen use for SAGD) and whether current and future flows are wisely managed by industry and government, irrespective of energy return on investment.
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