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ABMI releases first report on biodiversity in Athabasca Oil Sands Area

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The Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute (ABMI) released the first comprehensive report on the status of Alberta’s species in the Athabasca Oil Sands Area (AOSA). It also contains the Athabasca oil sands deposit, which represents 77% of Canada’s proven oil reserves and supports a growing energy extraction sector. “

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Ionic Liquids Process Recovers Bitumen from Utah Oil Sands With Little Water Use

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A team at Penn State University has demonstrated that a previously developed method employing ionic liquids (ILs) together with a nonpolar solvent such as toluene can effect a separation of bitumen from oil sands in the Western US at ambient temperatures (~25 °C), although with greater difficulty than Canadian oil sands.

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Study concludes permanent loss of peatlands in open-pit oil sands mining adds significantly to carbon burden of oil sands production

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Researchers at the University of Alberta (Canada) have quantified the transformation of the boreal landscape by open-pit oil sands mining in Alberta, Canada to evaluate its effect on carbon storage and sequestration. t of CO 2 lost, as much as 7-y worth of mining and upgrading emissions at 2010 production levels.

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Canada introduces new integrated plan for oil sands monitoring

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Summary of the current oil sands developments (mining and in-situ) and associated land use. Canada’s Environment Minister Peter Kent released an integrated monitoring plan for the oil sands region. fail in its goal of generating the data necessary to provide assurance that the oil sands are.

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U Calgary study finds oil shale most energy intensive upgraded fuel followed by in-situ-produced bitumen from oil sands

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A team at the University of Calgary (Canada) has compared the energy intensities and lifecycle GHG emissions of unconventional oils (oil sands and oil shale) alongside shale gas, coal, lignite, wood and conventional oil and gas. This is not the same as crude oil occurring naturally in shales, as in the Bakken.

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New study finds GHG emissions from palm oil production significantly underestimated; palm oil biofuels could be more climate-damaging than oil sands fuels

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Mha (20%) of the peatlands of Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra and Borneo in 2010, surpassing the area of Belgium and causing an annual carbon emission from peat decomposition of 230–310 Mt CO 2 e. —Miettinen et al. Slightly more than half of the GHG emissions for these biofuels in the EPA’s analysis came from land use change.

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Sustainable Development Canada Awards C$6M to Project to Reduce Water and Energy Consumption for Oil Sands Processing; Three Other Projects Supported to Reduce Energy and Environmental Impact of Oil Sands

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SOLVE adds a solvent to the steam in SAGD (basic operation depicted above) to reduce energy input and water consumption. The production well extracts the bitumen to surface heavy oil production facilities. SAGD is the predominant in-situ recovery method currently used in Canada’s oil sands. Source: StatoilHydro.

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