An Imperial Oil pipeline spilled 843,000 litres of bitumen emulsion northwest of Cold Lake, Alta., last week.

In a statement to CBC News, Imperial Oil spokesperson Lisa Schmidt said teams responded immediately. The release, which occurred April 9, has been stopped and contained, and cleanup and remediation are underway.

“We are sorry this incident occurred,” Schmidt wrote.

An Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) spokesperson confirmed the agency sent inspectors to the site of the spill — about 30 kilometres northwest of Cold Lake, a city near the Alberta-Saskatchewan border.

The AER incident report says the emergency phase is over. The report and Imperial Oil say no impacts to wildlife or waterbodies have been identified so far.

Although, Kevin Timoney, ecologist with Treeline Ecological Research, has studied thousands of spills and believes wildlife and waterbodies could be affected.

“There are always impacts and I know that, in the vast majority of cases, those impacts are not adequately reported,” Timoney said. 

Schmidt said the cause of the spill is undetermined at this point, but it’s being investigated.

Cold Lake First Nations Chief Kelsey Jacko said he also sent officials to the site to assess the impact and come up with a plan to move forward. When he spoke with CBC News, he said he was still waiting to hear more details about the incident.

“Spills happen every year,” Jacko said, adding that they impact the nation’s treaty rights. 

“How do you build up trust when spills keep happening?”

Schmidt said people from the First Nation visited the site last week.

She said Imperial Oil has agreed protocols with local Indigenous communities to notify them when incidents happen, and it is working to answer follow-up questions.

But Jacko also wants the First Nation to have a seat at the energy regulator’s table.

“The environment’s losing. Everybody’s thinking about money,” he said. 

“One day, oil is going to leave,” he said. “Is the land going to be as pristine as it once was? What is the legacy we’re leaving behind?”

Incident report lacks info: ecologist

Timoney, the ecologist, said the AER incident report is lacking information, which is common.

“You’re left guessing,” he said.

For example, there’s no information on the length of the spill, nor the environment where the spill happened, whether it was a forest, wetland or waterbody. Timoney noted that some ecosystems are more sensitive to spills than others.

There’s also little breakdown on what was in the spill, such as the concentration of bitumen or saltwater, he said.

This particular spill included saltwater, which Timoney said is often “far more toxic than the oil or bitumen.”

Oil and bitumen can break down, but salt lasts forever, he said.

“These saline spills are extremely serious.”

The AER spokesperson said any non-compliance penalties, if warranted, will be posted publicly on the agency’s compliance dashboard.