Nexen shut down the pipeline at its 72,000-barrel-per-day Long Lake facility, about 36 kilometres southeast of the oilsands hub of Fort McMurray, and isolated it as part of the clean up operation.
Advertisement
The deal signals that pipeline development can proceed, and Alberta’s oil sands can expand, if it’s all done responsibly.
The global energy company says the leak – which is roughly the equivalent of 31,500 barrels of emulsion, or two Olympic-sized pools – has since been “stabilized” and cleanup is underway. Last March, 2.7 million liters of condensate (about 17,000 barrels, or 700,000 gallons), used to dilute heavy oil so it flows through pipelines, were spilled at Murphy Oil’s Seal oilfield in northwestern Alberta.
Bailey says it’s in a remote area and the spill is contained to Nexen’s right of way, but the company is setting up barriers to keep out wildlife.
Nexen said in a statement that the spill was mostly within the pipeline corridor.
“It is now home to the largest spill in Canadian history”, the First Nation said in a release.
The regulator has sent investigators to Long Lake to try and determine the cause of the pipeline failure.
“We did have a contractor actually walking the pipeline and that’s how we discovered it”, said Ron Bailey, senior vice-president of Canadian operations for Nexen Energy ULC, which was acquired by China’s CNOOC Ltd.in 2013.
“We’ll be doing an investigation into what went wrong and … whether everything was done to catch it as soon as it could be, as well as to prevent it at the outset”, Notley said at a news conference.
The company said it thinks restarting the pipeline, which connects its Kinosis oil sands project to the Long Lake facility, will take “some time”. “As provincial premiers talk about ways to streamline the approval process for new tar sands pipelines, we have a stark reminder of how risky they can be”, Greenpeace said in a news release about the latest spill, reports Huffington Post. She said she was “troubled” by the “unfortunate accident” but said that pipelines are still the best way to transport oil and gas. “We’re not sure how long it took for the volume that is being reported out”, said Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs Grand Chief Stewart Phillip in Vancouver on Friday.
Advertisement
“We’re doing the research to fully understand when it may have occurred”, Bailey said.
