“The AER estimates over $45 billion in remediation and reclamation liabilities in the oilsands. This number may be a dramatic underestimate, with figures in leaked, official presentations suggesting as much as $130 billion in liabilities covered by less than $2 billion in security deposits,” University of Calgary School of Public Policy researchers Martin Olszynski, Andrew Leach, Drew Yewchuk wrote in a recent paper.
To To put this in perspective, Giant Mine and Faro mine, which are much, much smaller mines, have cleanup bills around 4-5 billion.
Albertans have gone all in on difficult to extract oil that is sold at discount… On a market that’s controlled by a cartel [OPEC].
E: Faro mine is 25 km2 in size. the current mineable footprint for the oil sands 1,030 km2 in size.
Just to add another one, the Sydney Tar Ponds covered 102 hectares (1.02 km^2) and cost $400M (2013) to clean up.
One of the Tailings ponds I’m familiar with is 9 km x 6 km in size…54km2