Grant: Engage Grants Program

The company-specific problem addressed by the proposed project is the long-term variability and reliability ofthe flow of the Athabasca River, which is the major source of water for the extraction and processing ofbitumen from the oil sands in northeastern Alberta. The primary research objective is to reconstruct the annualand seasonal flow of the Athabasca River for the past 500-600 years using annual growth increments inDouglas fir and Limber pine at a network of sites in the upper reaches of the river basin and in adjacentwatersheds. The research questions are 1) to what extent do gauged flows, which are the basis for surface waterallocation, fail to capture the full range of hydroclimatic variability and extremes evident in a longer proxyrecord, and 2) what are the implications for oil sands extraction and processing of this paleohydrology, and inparticular low-frequency hydroclimatic variability and extended periods of low flows. The industrial partner,Canada's Oil Sands Innovation Alliance (COSIA) is an alliance of oil sands producers focused on acceleratingthe pace of improvement in environmental performance in Canada's oil sands through collaborative action andinnovation. The most innovative aspect of the proposed research is the longer view of water level variability. Afoundational concept in water resource engineering is the assumption of stationarity - that climate andhydrological regimes fluctuate within a constant range of variability represented by instrumental records. Theassumption of stationarity is undermined by studies of the climate and hydrology of the past millennium. Theproposed research will provide data and knowledge to limit risk from climate variability, and informmanagement practices and engineering design for sustainable water use. The most challenging consequence ofa warming climate is amplified hydroclimatic variability. Future climate will consist of internal variability plusthe hydrologic response to warming oceans and atmosphere. In the near term, natural variability, as revealed intree-ring records, will continue to dominate.