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Imperial advances cleanup from drainage pond overflow at Kearl

March 06, 2023

Imperial today provided an update on its cleanup of a drainage pond overflow at its Kearl oil sands facility.

Work to clean up overflow released from the drainage pond on January 31, 2023, has made significant progress both on and in close proximity to the Kearl operations lease. All impacted surface ice and snow in the area has now been removed and safely disposed. 

Based on our monitoring, released fluids did not enter any waterways and there have been no impacts to local drinking water sources. There is no indication of impact to wildlife. Imperial will continue to work closely with the Alberta Energy Regulator to certify the cleanup.

Imperial plans to invite community leaders to visit the site and will continue to be responsive in addressing questions and concerns from local Indigenous communities and municipalities in the area.

"First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest apologies for this incident. Cleanup is well advanced, and we are taking all necessary steps to prevent this from happening again. We want to assure communities in the area that monitoring is ongoing and there have been no impacts to waterways,” said Simon Younger, senior vice president of upstream at Imperial. 

“Imperial has always been dedicated to transparently communicating with our community partners, including local Indigenous communities, as they rightly expect. We recognize that we have fallen short of these expectations, and we are committed to rebuilding trust by keeping them regularly informed of our operations as we continue addressing this issue.”

Imperial is continuing to address a separate issue related to seepage in close proximity to the Kearl lease. The seepage is primarily natural groundwater and precipitation, with a small amount of industrial wastewater. Extensive and ongoing water monitoring has confirmed that seepage has not entered local waterways. As such, there have been no impacts to local drinking water sources. There is no indication of impact to wildlife.

In compliance with regulations, the Kearl facility has an advanced seepage interception system for its tailings area, which is a customary design feature for operations such as Kearl. Based on the ongoing investigation conducted in full cooperation with the AER, we have determined that the seepage occurred in shallower ground layers not protected by the system. 

Imperial is undertaking several immediate actions to rectify this issue. 

These actions include:

  1. Ongoing extensive monitoring of local waterways;
  2. Drilling work which is underway to install additional monitoring and collection wells to expand the site’s existing seepage interception system to better protect against seepage events at all levels;
  3. Construction of additional drainage collection structures; 
  4. Adding additional surface pumps to ensure water is returned to collection areas.

Monitoring and sampling programs will continue and Imperial is committed to keeping all stakeholders fully informed as our plans progress. 

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