July 16, 2025
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Oil and gas activity can have a wide range of impacts on natural ecosystems, from the initial exploration stage, through development, production and decommissioning of infrastructure.
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Oil and gas wells, pumping stations, roads, pipelines and collecting systems all have a substantial footprint, and so a clear and open lifetime planning system is vital to ensure avoidance of sensitive ecosystems.
- Introduction
- Impacts
- History
- Archive
- Other Areas
Prairie Bluff, Castle (N. Douglas)
Moose Mountain well, Kananaskis (N. Douglas)
According to Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development, oil and gas well reclamation is progressing at a much slower rate than well abandonment. This is resulting in a buildup of uncertified wells. On average, between 2002 and 2011, 14,227 wells were drilled per year, 4,111 were abandoned and 1,682 certified. This indicates that over the last 10 years, the certification rate has been approximately 40.9 per cent of the abandonment rate (Oil and Gas Reclamation, Alberta ESRD, March 2012)
Position
Alberta Wilderness Association believes that hydrocarbon exploration and development should be regulated in a manner that is consistent with the maintenance of wilderness values. There is a fundamental need for the maintenance of wilderness that is free of industrial incursion. Outside of such areas, exploration and development must be conducted in an environmentally responsible manner.
Natural gas withdraws and consumes large amounts of water during extraction and energy production. The life cycle consumption and withdrawal based on input, plant, and cooling type is reported in the following table.
| Input | Plant Type | Cooling Type | Consumption coefficient (L/kWh or m3/MWh) | Withdrawals coefficient (L/kWh or m3/MWh) | Percent consumption to withdrawal | Consumption for 1000 MW Plant (L/Year) | Withdrawals for 1000 MW Plant (L/Year) | Consumption Compared to # of Albertans Avg. Annual Use |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Cogeneration | Cooling Pond | 0.31 | 0.67 | 46% | 2,170,000,000 | 4,690,000,000 | 30,488 |
| Shale Gas | Cogeneration | Cooling Pond | 0.38 | 0.74 | 51% | 2,660,000,000 | 5,180,000,000 | 37,373 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Cogeneration | Cooling Tower | 0.32 | 0.62 | 52% | 2,240,000,000 | 4,340,000,000 | 31,472 |
| Shale Gas | Cogeneration | Cooling Tower | 0.39 | 0.69 | 57% | 2,730,000,000 | 4,830,000,000 | 38,356 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Cogeneration | Dry Cooling | 0.07 | 0.1 | 70% | 490,000,000 | 700,000,000 | 6,884 |
| Shale Gas | Cogeneration | Dry Cooling | 0.14 | 0.17 | 82% | 980,000,000 | 1,190,000,000 | 13,769 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Cogeneration | Once Through | 0.23 | 14.66 | 2% | 1,610,000,000 | 102,620,000,000 | 22,620 |
| Shale Gas | Cogeneration | Once Through | 0.3 | 14.73 | 2% | 2,100,000,000 | 103,110,000,000 | 29,505 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | NG Combined Cycle | Cooling Pond | 0.72 | 1.15 | 63% | 5,012,000,000 | 8,022,000,000 | 70,418 |
| Shale Gas | NG Combined Cycle | Cooling Pond | 0.8 | 1.23 | 65% | 5,596,000,000 | 8,606,000,000 | 78,623 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | NG Combined Cycle | Cooling Tower | 0.69 | 1.02 | 68% | 4,802,000,000 | 7,112,000,000 | 67,468 |
| Shale Gas | NG Combined Cycle | Cooling Tower | 0.77 | 1.1 | 70% | 5,386,000,000 | 7,696,000,000 | 75,673 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | NG Combined Cycle | Dry Cooling | 0.12 | 0.15 | 80% | 833,000,000 | 1,064,000,000 | 11,704 |
| Shale Gas | NG Combined Cycle | Dry Cooling | 0.2 | 0.24 | 83% | 1,417,000,000 | 1,648,000,000 | 19,909 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | NG Combined Cycle | Once Through | 0.42 | 40.85 | 1% | 2,912,000,000 | 285,922,000,000 | 40,913 |
| Shale Gas | NG Combined Cycle | Once Through | 0.5 | 40.93 | 1% | 3,496,000,000 | 286,506,000,000 | 49,118 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Single/simple Cycle | 0.17 | 0.46 | 37% | 1,218,000,000 | 3,248,000,000 | 17,113 | |
| Shale Gas | Single/simple Cycle | 0.3 | 0.59 | 51% | 2,093,000,000 | 4,123,000,000 | 29,406 | |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Steam Cycle | Cooling Pond | 1.86 | 2.33 | 80% | 13,033,000,000 | 16,323,000,000 | 183,112 |
| Shale Gas | Steam Cycle | Cooling Pond | 2.01 | 2.48 | 81% | 14,094,000,000 | 17,384,000,000 | 198,019 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Steam Cycle | Cooling Tower | 2.42 | 2.98 | 81% | 16,953,000,000 | 20,873,000,000 | 238,188 |
| Shale Gas | Steam Cycle | Cooling Tower | 2.57 | 3.13 | 82% | 18,014,000,000 | 21,934,000,000 | 253,094 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Steam Cycle | Dry Cooling | 0.33 | 0.39 | 85% | 2,337,000,000 | 2,729,000,000 | 32,835 |
| Shale Gas | Steam Cycle | Dry Cooling | 0.49 | 0.54 | 91% | 3,398,000,000 | 3,790,000,000 | 47,741 |
| Conventional gas/CBM | Steam Cycle | Once Through | 1.27 | 138.39 | 1% | 8,903,000,000 | 968,743,000,000 | 125,086 |
| Shale Gas | Steam Cycle | Once Through | 1.42 | 138.54 | 1% | 9,964,000,000 | 969,804,000,000 | 139,993 |
| Note: Annual withdrawal and consumption for a 1000 MW plant are calculated with a capacity factor of 80 %, which assumes the plant runs for 7000 hrs in a year. Average Albertan consumption is assumed to be 71,175 L per year, based on Stats Canada’s Average daily litres of water used per capita in residential sector | ||||||||
| Table Source: Ali, B. & Kumar, A. 2015 Development of life cycle water footprints for gas-fired power generation technologies. Energy Conversion and Management, 110, 386 – 396 | ||||||||
2020
In February, AWA learned that Alberta-based Seven Generations Energy was the first Canadian natural gas producer to receive Equitable Origins’ (EO) certification to the EO100 standard. AWA has since engaged with Equitable Origins certifiers to support a sound application of the biodiversity provisions of their oil and gas certification, which we believe could help improve energy industry land-use practices. Since June, AWA has engaged directly with Seven Generations Energy around biodiversity concerns and opportunities in its Kakwa region lease holdings.
In early April, AWA voiced concerns about Alberta’s March 31 decision to suspend most energy industry environmental compliance reporting requirements. We were unconvinced that this was a pandemic safety-related measure since all data gathering and record-keeping requirements remained. We joined First Nations and other ENGOs in raising concerns when Alberta further suspended most environmental monitoring requirements in late April and early May; this occurred at a time when other economic activities were re-opening with pandemic safety measures in place. Although reporting and monitoring resumed in July 2020, AWA remains concerned about the interruption of compliance reporting and loss of data collection without transparent justification.
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