Yellowknife — May 4, 2023
Today, the Honourable Shane Thompson, Minister of Environment and Climate Change, issued the following statement on recent action taken to address two spills in Alberta:
“I acknowledge the commitments made by the Honourable Steven Guilbeault, Federal Minister of Environment and Climate Change, and the Honourable Sonya Savage, Alberta’s Minister of Environment and Protected Areas, following a series of spills at worksites in Alberta.
“In early March, our government learned second-hand of ongoing seepage and a spill of approximately 5.3 million litres of industrial wastewater into the forest and wetland at the Kearl oil sands operation north of Fort McMurray. This site is adjacent to the tributaries of the Muskeg and Firebag Rivers, which flow into the Athabasca River, and eventually to the Northwest Territories.
“We learned of another spill at a separate worksite little more than a month later – this time at the Suncor Fort Hills site north of Fort McMurray where nearly 6 million litres of tailings water was spilled into the environment.
“In both cases, the GNWT learned of these incidents second-hand, and not from the Government of Alberta – despite there being evidence of seepage at the Kearl site dating back to May 2022.
“These failures to communicate appropriately with affected Indigenous communities are in violation of the Alberta-NWT Transboundary Water Agreement – a shared management agreement that commits our governments to communicating quickly and transparently about issues which could affect our waters.
“In the wake of these failures, I have had productive meetings with both Minister Guilbeault and Minister Savage. Both Ministers have made commitments to address our government’s concerns and have agreed to improving lines of communication going forward. We look forward to action to meet these commitments – because transboundary water management agreements only work if all parties commit to information-sharing.
“While I am pleased that our government will have a seat on the Notification & Monitoring Working Group announced by Minister Guilbeault last week, there must be consistent representation of Indigenous peoples from the Northwest Territories for it to be successful. I urge Minister Guilbeault to build this into the working group’s mandate.
“I am also calling on the Government of Alberta to deliver on all commitments in our transboundary water management agreement, and the four specific commitments made during my meeting with Minister Savage on April 19, 2023.
“On behalf of the Government of Alberta, the Minister committed to: notifying our government of any spills as soon as they are aware of them; discussing improvements to communication and notification between Alberta and the GNWT on the new Notification and Monitoring Working Group; being supportive of the inclusion of the Alberta-NWT Bilateral Management Committee Indigenous representative on the new federal working group; and briefing the GNWT on findings of knowledge gap reports.
“Delivering on these commitments is essential because the water that flows, and the people who rely on it, do not care about provincial and territorial boundaries. The same water that may be affected by these spills flows to the traditional territories of First Nations, Inuit, and Métis, and to communities like Fort Smith who rely on the Slave River for hunting, fishing, and drinking water. Thankfully, enhanced testing near Fort Chipewyan and Fort Smith have not yet revealed any signs of contamination.
“We must continue to hold all parties responsible when it comes to the health of our most precious natural resource – water. The failures of these past months cannot happen again – and they must be fully investigated and corrected.
“Transboundary water management agreements only work if there is consistent communication and information-sharing between all parties. We will continue to push for these outcomes through all available avenues – because water is life, representation matters, information-sharing is critical, and no one – especially Indigenous communities – deserve to be left in the dark when it comes to the health of the water they rely on.”
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