https://www.nationalobserver.com/2019/04/08/news/how-alberta-kept-fort-mckay-first-nation-dark-about-toxic-cloud-oilsands
[images and links in online article]
How Alberta kept Fort McKay First Nation in the dark about a toxic cloud
from the oilsands
By Emma McIntosh & Mike De Souza in News, Energy, Politics | April 8th 2019
Just before 2 a.m. on June 20, 2016, a foul-smelling cloud of toxic
chemicals from a Syncrude oilsands plant began slowly drifting north
towards the hamlet of Fort McKay, 10 kilometres away.
Six weeks earlier, devastating wildfires ripped through Fort McMurray,
forcing a massive evacuation of the oil town and an emergency shutdown
of the company’s Mildred Lake plant. By late June, workers were trying
to restart the operation.
It didn’t go as planned.
An estimated 10,400 barrels of untreated petrochemicals were released
into a waste pond. It created a plume of toxic air that could cause
headaches and possibly long-term health risks for anyone on its path.
“This is an unprecedented event,” wrote an Alberta Energy Regulator
(AER) scientist in an email obtained through freedom-of-information
legislation.
The plume contained hydrogen sulphide, which can cause respiratory
issues at lower concentrations and death at higher ones. It also held
high amount of hydrocarbons — a group of compounds, some dangerous,
found in crude oil. Two of the most toxic are toluene, which affects
nerves, and benzene, a carcinogen.
Officials couldn’t tell if they were in the cloud that day.
They also couldn’t determine if the amount of toxic chemcials in the
plume would trigger an emergency until it reached Fort McKay, 10 hours
after it was released, a National Observer/Star Calgary investigation
has found.
By 11:30 a.m., a local official emailed colleagues with a warning.
“I personally cannot stay outside the (office) and breath[sic] the air
outside, it is pretty bad,” wrote Ryan Abel, a staffer at the Fort McKay
First Nation, in an email obtained by freedom-of-information.
“Definitely going to cause headaches, etc. for those breathing it in.”
Two hours after he sent that email, federal officials at Health Canada
decided to issue an air quality advisory for Fort McKay.
Insiders from within the Alberta Energy Regulator would later say that
the incident highlights one of the key problems facing the oil-rich
province, which has long-claimed to have the strongest environmental
regulations in the world. They say that pressure and lobbying from
industry and economic interests are trumping science and strong
oversight, putting public health and safety at risk.
The incident also highlights gaps in air quality monitoring, despite
federal and provincial efforts in recent years to improve how
governments are overseeing an industry in a region that holds the
world's third largest reserves of crude oil after Saudi Arabia and
Venezuela.
In the aftermath of the incident, the regulator fired its chief
scientist, a toxicologist who, according to internal records, tried to
warn the community of the danger. The regulator then sought to replace
her with a job posting that called for someone with lower qualifications.
AER staff clashed
For years, residents of Fort McKay have complained about foul-smelling
air pollution from the oilsands plants that surround it, though
long-term health effects have never been proven.
A post-mortem report leaked to National Observer and the Star also noted
that the incident occurred after some oilsands operators “pushed back”
against the AER’s efforts to coordinate the resumption of industrial
operations in a safe and orderly fashion. Insiders at the regulator said
that the industry was lobbying the regulator to get plants restarted as
fast as possible.
As the chemicals inched towards the town, AER staff clashed over whether
they should warn the community, say insiders interviewed by the
investigation. They didn’t have the data to know if the toxins in the
plume would put human health in danger.
“We really didn't know what the risks were going to be (for Fort
McKay),” said one person with direct knowledge of the AER’s
decision-making process, speaking confidentially for fear of
professional reprisal. “(At that time) there really was no human health
risk-based decision-making at the regulator. It was either you killed
someone or you didn't.”
Internal emails also show Syncrude didn’t communicate with Fort McKay
until an hour after the plume had arrived. It was “far too late under
these circumstances,” said Abel, the Fort McKay First Nation staffer, in
an email obtained by freedom-of-information.
Since then, Syncrude says it has updated its protocols for communicating
with Fort McKay and restarting the plant. The AER said it takes its
environmental responsibilities seriously and is working to improve
overall air quality in the area — a longstanding issue for the
community, which is surrounded on all sides by oilsands operations.
But oilsands operators are exempt from rules set by the AER that compel
companies to warn communities if they release toxic substances, so
Syncrude faced no consequences from the regulator.
“This could have potentially impacted the community’s ability to enact
an emergency response plan and undertake appropriate safety measures,”
said a passage of the leaked AER draft report on the incident.
'I never sleep with my windows open'
Syncrude spokesman Leithan Slade said the company is “continuously
improving” its notification protocols. The AER, which warned Fort McKay
five hours after the chemicals were released, said the community “would
have been notified immediately if there was a public health risk.”
That afternoon, Health Canada issued an air quality advisory warning
Fort McKay residents to “consider sheltering indoors.”
In response to the National Observer/Star findings, Alberta Environment
and Parks spokesperson Matt Dykstra said the government would conduct a
study into air quality near Fort McKay, but didn’t give details.
Fort McKay First Nation declined to comment, and Abel also declined to
speak about the incident. The McKay Métis didn’t respond to requests for
an interview.
The Cree, Dene and Métis people who live in Fort McKay used to survive
by hunting and trapping — now, good relationships with oil and gas
companies have allowed the community of 750 to prosper. The First
Nation’s businesses brought in $506 million in gross revenue from 2012
to 2016, according to a Fraser Institute report.
Industrial emissions are also a fact of life for Fort McKay, a community
of 300 homes and 750 people.
A sign outside the First Nation office warns residents to report odours
with a 1-800 number. The Athabasca River Valley can act like a funnel
for emissions, channelling releases from various oilsands facilities
towards Fort McKay.
Syncrude’s Mildred Lake plant is one of 11 oilsands facilities within a
30 km radius, with more planned and proposed. The company is owned
jointly by Suncor, Imperial Oil and Chinese-owned CNOOC and Sinopec.
Syncrude is also one of the largest operators in Canada oilsands, which
are estimated to comprise more than 98 per cent of the country's
estimated 173 billion barrels of oil reserves, according to the federal
government. The government also says that the oilsands sector is
Canada's fastest growing source of climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions.
In Fort McKay, visitors can see the First Nation’s wood and glass
administrative building, a shiny, new daycare centre and tidy homes with
pickup trucks in the driveways. A few times per year, every member of
the nation gets a share of the profits — in June 2018, individuals got a
cheque for $1,700 each, the nation’s website says.
“People are in positions where … they're scared because they don't want
to bite the hand that feeds them,” said L’Hommecourt.
The affluence comes with a cost: air quality in Fort McKay sometimes
exceeds air quality thresholds for toxic hydrocarbons like benzene and
toluene, and for other harmful substances like hydrogen sulphide, found
the 2016 study by the AER and Alberta Health.
Residents often smelled ammonia-like odour of cat pee, sewage, sulphur
and tarry bitumen. They had headaches, burning eyes and sore throats.
Sometimes they wondered if they should evacuate, the study said.
“Not a week goes by where you don’t smell anything,” said Jean
L’Hommecourt of Fort McKay First Nation.
Sometimes it’s ammonia — one leak of it from Syncrude in 2006 sent four
Fort McKay children and a teacher in to hospital. Other times, it’s
sulphur or gasoline.
The AER received 172 air quality complaints from Fort McKay between 2010
and 2014, a government report publicly released in 2016 found.
“I never sleep with my windows open... because you never know what
what's gonna come into your house in the middle of the night,”
L’Hommecourt said.
“I don't trust the government and I don't have faith in them... It's
always the same outcome. It seems like they say whatever they want to.”
Companies 'pushed back'
The AER/Alberta Health study, published September 2016, included
recommendations for improving air quality that are still in progress. It
did not mention the Syncrude release that happened a few months earlier.
AER scientists “were not allowed” to include it, or to publish the draft
report about the incident that was obtained by the investigation, said
the AER insider.
The AER said “finalizing the (draft report) was no longer necessary”
because it publicly released the AER/Alberta Health study.
In March 2017, the AER fired the toxicologist who warned Fort McKay
about the plume and co-authored the unreleased report, Monique Dubé. The
scientist hired to replace her as chief environmental scientist has
degrees in economics and engineering, according to his LinkedIn.
“The AER is conflicted. Its dual mandate to both grow the industry and
protect the environment means having to choose one over the other,” said
McMurray Métis president Gail Gallupe in a statement responding to
Dubé’s firing.
“With (Dubé) as chief environment scientist, we knew that we had a
serious voice for the environment within the AER. We worry now that her
voice is gone.”
The AER has said said it’s “confident” in the current chief scientist’s
abilities, but it has declined to comment on Dubé's departure.
On June 20, 2016, many Fort McKay residents hadn’t yet returned home
from the wildfire evacuations. Aside from a short local news story —
which didn’t mention the impact on Fort McKay or the severity of the air
quality readings — the chemical release from Syncrude received little
public attention.
The lingering wildfire smoke meant the air quality was already worse
than normal. The process of starting up an oil production facility can
cause emissions spikes, adding to the problem.
The AER had been trying to stagger several companies’ startups and
monitoring air quality around the clock.
It hadn’t been smooth sailing. The AER’s draft report notes that some
companies “pushed back” when asked for details on their plans. And some
operators didn’t tell the regulator quickly enough when they released
chemicals.
The first warning about Syncrude’s chemical release came at 1:38 a.m.,
when a company representative called the AER to report a gasoline-like
smell. Though Syncrude told the AER it didn’t evacuate anyone, the
company “had any workers in the area go to other facilities/buildings
where they would be safe,” the AER draft report said.
Officials would later determine that naphtha, a solvent, had been
released into a pond used to dump waste. The naphtha is supposed to be
separated in a ‘recovery unit’ before entering the tailings pond, but
there was an “operational failure,” AER briefing documents said.
'It wasn't a leak'
Slade, the Syncrude spokesperson, said the incident was part of a
“planned” but “complex” restart. “It wasn’t a leak.” There was an issue
that led to the machinery not working as planned, but the recovery unit
didn’t fail, he said.
“Since that incident, we have updated our flushing practices as well as
how we notify Fort McKay,” said Slade.
At about 4 a.m., the deteriorating air quality set off alarms at the
Wood Buffalo Environmental Association (WBEA), which does air monitoring
on behalf of the province.
In the Wood Buffalo region, oil and gas facilities have air monitors
along their fencelines. The one at Mildred Lake’s boundary was recording
levels of hydrogen sulphide three times greater than the provincial
standard — “sufficient evidence” that the release would cause odours
off-site, the AER draft report said.
It also picked up maximum hydrocarbon readings about 75 times greater
than the background conditions.
“These values are extremely high,” noted the regional environmental
association staffer who reported the readings to the AER at about 6
a.m., according to the draft report.
In this case, the air monitor at the Mildred Lake fenceline couldn’t
differentiate between harmless hydrocarbons and ones that could be
poisonous to breathe, the AER draft report said.
It measured total hydrocarbons, for which there’s no air standard.
That day, an air monitor within the plant picked up large amounts of
benzene, enough to clear workers from the area. And later, once the
plume reached Fort McKay, toluene was measured at levels above the upper
limit of the community monitor.
But there were no air monitors between Mildred Lake and Fort McKay that
would tell scientists whether the chemicals released were harmful. The
only air monitor that could do that was at the centre of the community.
And as of 3 a.m., the wind had been blowing towards it.
AER scientists decided the safest option was to warn the community. But
their bosses rejected the idea, saying it wasn’t clear there was any
risk, two insiders at the regulator said.
Eventually, at 7 a.m., Dubé — then-chief environmental scientist —
circumvented her bosses and sent an email to the Fort McKay First
Nation. It had been more than five hours since Syncrude reported the
release to the AER.
“Air quality exceedances — IMPORTANT,” read the email, obtained through
freedom-of-information legislation. “We expect odours in the community
this morning and today.”
“Another possible air quality episode for Fort McKay — yikes!” replied
someone else in the email chain. Their name and the organization they
represented were redacted.
Hydrocarbon levels were “the highest I’ve ever seen recorded in the
region,” they added.
'It's getting bad there'
Environment and Climate Change Canada staffers scrambled to access
real-time air monitoring data for the Fort McKay community station after
a 9 a.m. request from the AER.
“Could you please call me when you get these (emails),” an AER scientist
wrote. “There has been an upset at one of the plant sites… This is an
unprecedented event with respect to (hydrocarbon) levels.”
“The portal has been updated to provide access to our real-time data… as
fast as possible,” a staffer from the federal Environment Department
replied.
Officials waited as the plume crept north, air monitors gradually
picking up more and more of the sulphur compounds and hydrocarbons. It
reached the community at 10:45 a.m.
With the right data now in hand, public health officials raced to figure
out the risk: though not acutely toxic, there was a “strong odour,
suspected health effects associated,” the AER draft report said.
“It’s getting bad there,” an Environment and Climate Change Canada
employee wrote in an email at 1:30 p.m.
Though oil and gas companies in Alberta must follow a set of emergency
response guidelines that in some cases could include evacuation,
oilsands operators are exempt from those requirements.
In this case, it would have been up to Syncrude to decide whether to
tell Fort McKay about the chemical release. It did so at about noon, 10
hours after it reported the incident to the AER.
At 1:30 p.m. — 12 hours after the incident occurred and five and a half
hours after Health Canada was first told about it — the federal agency
issued its advisory.
The federal government published its warning two hours after air
monitoring confirmed the odour in the community. It spent the time
assessing the risks and drafting the statement, said Indigenous Services
Canada spokesperson William Olscamp in a written statement. (The agency
has since taken over Health Canada’s former responsibilities for First
Nations communities.)
Alberta government didn't say if it would introduce new standards for
hydrocarbons
No injuries were reported. Though the plume caused an exceedance of air
quality guidelines at the Mildred Lake fenceline, it didn’t breach any
standards in Fort McKay for hydrogen sulphide or specific hydrocarbons.
Dykstra, the Alberta Environment and Parks spokesperson, did not answer
questions about whether the government plans to create standards for
hydrocarbons.
The smell lessened over the course of the afternoon, but the air quality
advisory remained in place for nine days. On June 28, 2016, the day
before it was dropped, a Fort McKay representative reported that a
“significant odour” was “causing throat irritation after being outside
for several minutes,” the leaked AER draft report said.
In general, energy companies are required to notify the AER of chemical
releases — though there are exceptions, such as emissions from restarts
or emergencies. The agency posts incidents, investigations and actions
taken against companies on a public database available online.
An AER communications strategy document instructed staff to say the
agency was “conducting an investigation,” but no record of one appears
in the database.
The AER didn’t answer questions about the investigation’s outcome and
said the incident didn’t meet the criteria to be posted.
In a statement, the AER said it is working to improve overall air
quality in Fort McKay through 17 recommendations from its year-long
study of Fort McKay air quality, and three from the leaked report about
the June 20, 2016 incident.
The provincial government has clarified emergency response roles between
agencies since the incident, and created a 24-hour notification system
that informs the Fort McKay community if air quality readings reach a
trigger level for certain substances. Residents can also access
real-time air quality data from the monitor in the community.
But the government hasn’t created trigger levels for hydrocarbons. It
also hasn’t closed the air monitoring gaps that led to the initial
confusion on June 20, 2016, which means that Fort McKay continues to
face the same risks today.
Dysktra, the Alberta Environment and Parks spokesperson, said the
government’s review would be publicly available once complete.
The provincial regulator and the Alberta government have come under fire
in recent months after a National Observer/Global News/Star
investigation revealed the cost of cleaning up the province’s oilpatch
could reach an estimated $260 billion. It’s also faced criticism for
allowing oilsands companies to pursue an unproven technology to deal
with their toxic waste, also the subject of a Star/National Observer
investigation, and for leaving legal loopholes that allow companies to
abandon old wells without cleaning them up.
The Fort McKay incident raises further doubts about the independence and
the ability of the NDP-led government to regulate oil and gas, said
Alberta Liberal MLA David Swann.
“The government has some explaining to do,” he said.
The Jason Kenney-led United Conservative Party — which is leading in
polls for the current provincial election, and has pledged to replace
the AER's board of directors with one focused on "cutting red tape" —
didn't respond to several requests for an interview on the National
Observer/Star Calgary investigation's findings. The centre-right Alberta
Party declined to comment.
Keeping gas masks at home
L’Hommecourt, the Fort McKay resident, said she doesn’t see how anything
short of establishing new limits on chemical emissions will help.
“Do you want to depend… on (the government) to protect you or are you
going to take measures into your own hands?” she said. “We have to be
ready for a catastrophe.”
L’Hommecourt said the access to air quality data brings her some
comfort. But still, she worries about the long-term effects of the
constant industrial odours, and keeps gas masks at home.
Meanwhile, new oilsands mines around Fort McKay continue to be approved:
Suncor opened its Fort Hills mine in September, the same month that the
AER held hearings for a new mine proposed by Teck Resources Ltd.
“How (can officials) say they're going to make things better or air
quality better when they're approving more and more projects,”
L’Hommecourt said.
“Your roots are here but at the same time they're being ripped out from
under our feet.”
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