Grant: Research Tools and Instruments - Category 1 (<$150,000)

Development of Alberta's Oil Sands is a strong driver for Canada's economy and supplies oil for North America. Extraction and upgrading of this bitumen results in large quantities of tailings that consist of waste sand and water, water and fine clays released during extraction. Each barrel of production results in one cubic meter of sand and ¼ cubic meter of mature fine tailings after settling of clays in the tailings pond. The sand is used to construction impoundments to contain the process affected water and the mature fine tailings. Design of the impoundment requires knowledge of the dewatering rate (sedimentation and consolidation) of the clays as they form mature fine tailings and then of the MFT to ensure safe containment. The application is to purchase equipment to carry out large scale self weight consolidation tests on mature fine tailings from four separate mine operations. They differ due to variation in the geology of the oil sands deposits and the different chemical process aids used during extraction of the bitumen. The column tests will provide measurement on the differences in dewatering rates while chemical analysis of the water and mineral components will provide information on the differences in geochemistry of each sample. Purchase of this equipment will maintain University of Alberta in a leadership role in understanding the behaviour of oil sands tailings and mature fine tailings and provide valuable information to both tailings management specialist and regulators who oversee the industry.