News Release: Oil sands companies used more water last year, despite regulator’s claim of improved efficiency

December 18, 2024

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December 18, 2024 (Updated December 19, 2024)

A new report published by the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) shows four oil sands companies used more than 220 billion litres of freshwater in 2023 alone, an increase of almost 12 billion litres from 2022, something the AER publicly describes as an improvement.

According to the AER’s annual report, in 2022, 208.6 billion litres of freshwater were used to produce 657 million barrels of oil (i.e., 317.5 litres of freshwater per barrel), while in 2023 companies used 220.1 billion litres of freshwater to produce 669 million barrels of oil (i.e., 328.9 litres of freshwater per barrel). This represents a 3.5 percent increase in freshwater consumption per barrel of oil, for only a 2 percent increase in oil sands production.

“If companies were using water more efficiently, as the AER is claiming, we should be seeing freshwater consumption rising less than oil sands production, not more,” said Phillip Meintzer, conservation specialist at the Alberta Wilderness Association.

Meintzer reviewed last year’s report and found that in 2023 oil sands companies used more water to produce each barrel of oil — contrary to claims that were made by the regulator. In the AER’s press release about the new report, CEO Laurie Pushor is quoted as saying: “Industry’s improvements in water use reflect our shared commitment to responsible and efficient resource development.” But according to the AER’s own report, oil sands companies are actually using more water to produce each barrel of oil.

“It appears the AER is misrepresenting the facts of its own report as there have not been improvements in water use, but rather a worsening of the problem,” Meintzer said.

The Industry Water Use Performance Report, is published annually by the AER, and it is intended to show how “water is allocated and used to recover oil, gas, and oil sands resources.”

According to the latest report, 20.8 percent of the 1059 million cubic meters of total water came from freshwater sources in 2023. This is equivalent to more than 220 billion litres of freshwater — or more than 240 Olympic sized swimming pools per day — used by just four companies (CNRL, Imperial, Suncor, and Syncrude) in Alberta’s oil sands. That amount could provide 5 million people (more than Alberta’s current population) with 12 litres of water per day, every day for 10 years.

“It’s concerning because this massive amount of freshwater used by just four oil companies represents only 26 percent of the total allocation that those companies have been given licenses for by the Government of Alberta,” said Meintzer. “Companies could be withdrawing substantially more freshwater, regardless of the impacts to ecosystems or downstream communities.”

Over the past few years there has been a heightened concern over drought conditions across Alberta, with the provincial government creating a drought advisory committee, facilitating water sharing agreements, launching a water availability survey, and discussing inter-basin water transfers, all in an effort to try and address the issue. But when you consider the massive volume of water used by just four companies in the oil sands, another option for protecting Alberta’s dwindling freshwater could be placing stricter limits on the industry instead.

For more information, contact:

Phillip Meintzer, (403) 283-2025, pmeintzer@abwild.ca

A Note on the Update: 

Our press release was updated on December 19, 2024. This update was made because we originally used the 21% freshwater number as stated by the AER in the written portion of its report. However, upon closer inspection of the supporting data, the percentage was actually 20.8%. When dealing with such large volumes of water, a 0.2% difference represents a large difference in water (roughly 2 billion litres). This change meant that the water use intensity increased by 3.5% between 2022 and 2023, as opposed to the 5% which was originally reported in AWA’s press release on December 18.