Oil sands are also commonly referred to as tar sands.
According to The Tyee [www.thetyee.ca] the term tar sands was more widely used than oil sands to describe Alberta's bitumen fields until the 1960s, when the provincial government made it a formal policy to call it oil sands.
The oil sands are a combination of clay, sand, water and bitumen which is a heavy black viscous oil.
Tar sands can be mined and processed to extract oil from the bitumen. Because bitumen can not be pumped from the ground in its natural state the deposits are mined, usually in an open pit.
Oil sands are not unique to Canada and are found in 70 countries worldwide, however the main deposits are found in Canada and Venezuela.
The largest deposit in the world is the Athabasca oil sands near Fort McMurray.
According to Energy Alberta, [www.energy.alberta.ca] bitumen is a soluble organic matter that is solid at room temperature. The crude bitumen within the sands is a naturally occurring viscous mixture of hydrocarbons often with sulphur compounds, that will not flow in its natural state. Upon heating the bitumen will flow and on a hot summers鈥� day, bitumen oozes from the outcrops along the river valleys in Northeast Alberta.
Energy Alberta also say that since the 1990s, bitumen has evolved as a major source of energy in Canada and crude bitumen production has exceeded conventional crude oil production in the province.
In Alberta, oil sands cover an area of approximately 140,000 km2 and once mined and processed, generate oil similar to oil pumped from conventional wells.
Energy Alberta say that extracting oil from the oil sands is a complicated process. Oil sands recovery includes extraction and separation systems to separate the bitumen from the clay, sand, and water that make up the tar sands.
Bitumen also requires additional upgrading before it can be refined. Because it is so thick, it also requires dilution with lighter hydrocarbons to make it transportable by pipelines.
According to the oil shake and tar sands programmatic EIS information centre, much of the world's oil (more than 2 trillion barrels) is in the form of tar sands, although it is not all recoverable.
They say that only Canada has a large scale commercial tar sands industry, however a small amount of oil from tar sands is produced commercially in Venezuela.
More than one million barrels of synthetic oil are produced from the Canadian oil sands industry per day.
The oil shake and tar sands programmatic EIS information centre also say that currently, tar sands represent about 40 per cent of Canada's oil production and output is expanding rapidly.
Approximately 20 per cent of U.S. crude oil and products come from Canada and a substantial portion of this amount comes from tar sands
About two tons of oil sands are required to produce one barrel of oil.
After oil extraction, the spent sand and other materials are then returned to the oil sands mine, which is eventually reclaimed.
According to the government of Alberta, currently, over 65 km2 of the oil sands have been reclaimed.
They say reclamation certificates are not issued until monitoring through time demonstrates reclaimed sites meet criteria for return to self-sustaining ecosystems.
As of June 2008, the Alberta government held over $721 million in reclamation security from oil sands mining companies.
Due to the long time frames and massive scale of oil sands projects, reclamation of disturbed lands can take decades.
The reclamation process occurs throughout the life of the project and the final reclamation certification occurs when the land is no longer in use and has been fully reclaimed.
The government of Alberta say they are taking a cautious and responsible approach regarding the issuance of reclamation certificates.
For more information on the oil sands go to the Oil shake and tar sands programmatic EIS information centre website at www.ostseis.anl.gov, www.energy.alberta.ca or www.environment.alberta.ca.
