Government of Alberta Mountaintop Removal is refusing to release information about toxic pollutants in snowpacks downwind from coal mines.
The data was collected by two senior provincial government scientists who conducted research into the effects of dust blown from mines on a pristine Alberta alpine lake in British Columbia. They recently published a paper concluding that the sediment in Window Lake is just as contaminated as the lakes downstream from the oil spill.
They also analyzed contaminants in the area’s snowpacks, data yet unpublished. The data appears to have been presented to senior Alberta Environment staff in November.
The Canadian Press filed a Freedom of Information request to release that presentation. In response, the news agency received a copy of a slide deck containing information that was already public, with major cuts redacted.
A comment that survived the corrections suggests that the entire document included information on contaminant levels in the snowpack around Window Lake.
Under the heading “Next Steps,” the released document says: “Proposal to take additional lake sediment and ice samples.”
How the cuts were justified also suggests that the data exist. The information was removed under sections of the law that allow the government not to disclose documents containing valuable intellectual property or to protect a researcher’s right of first publication.
The Canadian Press contacted an Alberta scientist not employed by the province who has seen and confirmed the data.
Bill Donahue is another independent scientist in BC and former head of two branches in Alberta’s Environmental Monitoring and Science Division. He hasn’t seen Snowpack research.
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They pointed out that even though the initial concentrations of heavy metals and hydrocarbons found in the bottom side of mines are low, they do not get destroyed and gradually build up in the environment. Also, contaminants from the snowpack are often released in a concentrated pulse as buildup over months is released during the spring melt.
“The amount in the snowpack at a given time in a given year may vary, but it is an absolute certainty that regional pollutant accumulations today over all scenarios are much higher than they should be and that coal mining (South East BC) is the cause.” is,” he wrote in an email.
The paper on sediments in Window Lake, published in November in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, reached a troubling conclusion.
It found that levels of pollutants such as polycyclic aromatic compounds, known carcinogens, were 30 times higher than pre-industrial levels and in some cases exceeded Canadian guidelines for the safety of aquatic life. Selenium levels, toxic to fish, had doubled.
At the time, Alberta Environment did not make any of the paper’s authors available for interview.
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Other scientists in both the United States and Canada praised the work.
Emily Bernhardt, an ecologist at Duke University in North Carolina who has published extensively on mountaintop coal mining, called the research groundbreaking and convincing. She said this confirms what other papers have found – that mountain coal mining spreads pollutants beyond mine sites.
Alberta’s United Conservative government is currently blocking coal mine exploration and development in the province’s Rocky Mountains.
However, the policy is implemented by ministerial order, which can be revoked at any time without notice.
Alberta Energy Minister Peter Guthrie has said there are no plans to lift the order. But he has not specified how long it will remain in place or indicated whether it will be reinforced by legislation or regulation.
© 2023 The Canadian Press