New oilsands scrutiny tech leaves timberland intact, that is good news for caribou
One of a many mortal ecological impacts of oil and gas scrutiny happens prolonged before a litre of oil flows into a tube or a singular atom of CO enters a atmosphere.
Seismic contemplating — a scrutiny activity that helps brand where to cavalcade — can outcome in as most as 15 per cent of a timberland being chopped down and mulched.
But a new kind of seismic consult promises to leave usually feet prints in a forest. And that’s good news for class such as a threatened woodland caribou that live alongside a oilsands attention in northern Alberta.
“We can do it, it works. We don’t have to cut a timberland down anymore,” pronounced Allan Chatenay, co-owner of Explor Geophysical Ltd. and contriver of a PinPoint technology.
The Calgary-based association worked with oilsands hulk Suncor Energy Inc. over a past winter to see how a record stacks adult in comparison with normal seismic techniques on one of a unexplored oilsands leases.
The subsequent step will be a commercial-scale hearing directed during proof it can contest on cost as good as effectiveness.
Put simply, seismic contemplating involves formulating sound waves in a earth that rebound off hilly formations hundreds of metres subterraneous and afterwards are available by sensors on a aspect for analysis.
Traditionally, surveys were conducted regulating truck-mounted drilling gear, complicated sensors and bomb inclination weighing several kilograms each. Straight, six- to eight-metre-wide seismic lines were chopped by a timberland on rectilinear grids to assent entrance and safeguard a apparatus was positioned to grasp a best results.
Sensors carried into timberland on foot
The stream standard, called low-impact seismic, cuts lines that are about 3 metres wide, mostly in a crooked settlement on a arrogance that it prevents predators from being means to see their chase from a distance.
PinPoint takes a record one step serve by scaling down a distance of a sensors and charges so they can be carried into a timberland by people on foot. By severely augmenting a series of revoke powered seismic events and their recordings, and estimate them regulating minute GPS readings and accurate timing, Chatenay says a consult formula are usually as minute as normal seismic.
Finding new ways to acquire seismic information fits in with goals by a industry, regulators and a Indigenous village to support caribou conservation, pronounced Christine Daly, a comparison record confidant for land reclamation during Suncor.
“Any fragmentation of a boreal timberland has an impact on a animals in that ecosystem, including boreal woodland caribou, that are a threatened species,” she said.
“We satisfied one of a base causes of a impact from a attention are these seismic lines, so totally stealing them is a outrageous step in opening some-more obliged growth and caribou conservation.”
Caribou habitats need improvement
Only about 25 per cent of caribou ranges in a oilsands area are deliberate undisturbed, pronounced Simon Dyer, emissary executive executive of a Pembina Institute environmental think-tank.
That’s good next a 65 per cent composed ratio compulsory to concede threatened caribou populations be self-sustaining, according to a 2012 sovereign supervision Species during Risk Act liberation devise report.
“A large writer to that fragmentation and detriment of medium is a seismic footprint so any technologies that can forestall additional waste of medium are apparently welcome,” he said.
“Slowing a rate of detriment of medium is not good adequate …. Any obliged association should be proposing a devise that has a net alleviation in caribou habitat, not usually a reduced impact.”
The PinPoint record requires some-more work than other form of seismic so it costs more, Chatenay said, though being specific.
Technology could assistance companies save costs
On a other hand, he said, it saves users a cost of carrying to after uproot and remediate seismic lines and might assistance companies tumble in line with destiny environmental regulation.
Suncor is looking during several technologies to revoke a impact of a seismic surveys and it will expected be years before any can be implemented on a blurb scale, pronounced Gary Bunio, ubiquitous manager of oilsands devise record development.
He pronounced a cost is critical to cruise though it’s not a usually emanate — Suncor could confirm on a some-more costly choice if it provides a resolution that is effective and is permitted by village stakeholders and regulators.
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Article source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/seismic-tech-oilsands-caribou-suncor-alberta-1.4762568?cmp=rss