While at a brand new oil ...

While at a brand new oil sands mining facility in northern Alberta, Canada, I was assigned as the Environmental Advisor monitoring the construction, planting, and testing of a demonstration-level treatment wetland.  The intent was to treat runoff that had been in contact with overburden materials that potentially could contain bitumen.  Unfortunately, staff was cut in December 2015 due to the decline in oil price, and I have learned little new since that time about the results of testing.

One potential drawback to the design of cascading pools was failure to account for the erosive potential of the flowing water, as the gradient was quite steep.  Additional issues included the presence of an HDPE liner beneath the system that limited the depth of planted substrate rooting, and the presence of saturated muskeg in the immediate area of the test facility.