Athabasca Oil Sands
The Athabasca Oil Sands are a large deposit of oil-rich bitumen located in northern Alberta, Canada. These oil sands consist of a mixture of crude bitumen (a semi-solid form of crude oil), silica sand, clay minerals, and water. The Athabasca deposit is the largest of three oil sands deposits in Alberta, along with the Peace River and Cold Lake deposits. Together, these oil sand deposits cover about 141 000 km² of sparsely populated boreal forest and muskeg (peat bogs). The Athabasca oil sands are named after the Athabasca River which cuts through the heart of the deposit, and traces of the heavy oil are readily observed on the river banks. Historically, the bitumen was used by the indigenous Cree and Dene Aboriginal peoples to waterproof their canoes. The oil deposits are located within the boundaries of Treaty 8, and several First Nations of the area are involved with the sands. The oil sands were first seen by Europeans in 1788.
The key characteristic of the Athabasca deposit is that it is the only one shallow enough to be suitable for surface mining. About 10% of the Athabasca oil sands are covered by less than 75 metres (250 feet) of overburden. The mineable area as defined by the Alberta government covers 37 contiguous townships (about 3400 square kilometres or 1300 square miles) north of the city of Fort McMurray. The overburden consists of 1 to 3 metres of water-logged muskeg on top of 0 to 75 metres of clay and barren sand, while the underlying oil sands are typically 40 to 60 metres thick and sit on top of relatively flat limestone rock. As a result of the easy accessibility, the world's first oil sands mine was started by Great Canadian Oil Sands (now Suncor) back in 1967. The Syncrude mine (the biggest mine in the world) followed in 1978, and the Albian Sands mine (operated by Shell Canada) in 2003. All three of these mines are associated with bitumen upgraders that convert the unusable bitumen into synthetic crude oil for shipment to refineries in Canada and the United States.
The Athabasca oil sands are primarily located in and around the city of Fort McMurray which was still, in the late 1950s, primarily a wilderness outpost of a few hundred people whose main economic activities included fur trapping and salt mining. Since the energy crisis of the 1970s, Fort McMurray has been transformed into a boomtown of 80,000 people struggling to provide services and housing for migrant workers, many of them from Eastern Canada, especially Newfoundland.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athabasca_Oil_Sands
Fort McMurray
Location
Fort McMurray is located 370 m above sea level. It is 435 km northeast of Edmonton on Highway 63, about 60 km west of the Saskatchewan border, nestled in the boreal forest at the confluence of the Athabasca River and the Clearwater River. Fort McMurray is the largest community in the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo.
Population
The 2006 population of Wood Buffalo is 79,810, with the majority of that located within the immediate area of Fort McMurray. Because Fort McMurray no longer has a municipal government of its own (it gave up its city status upon incorporation into Wood Buffalo in 1995) it is technically a hamlet, even though its population is 64,441.[1] Fort McMurray is a multicultural community, attracting people from all corners of Canada and the world. Albertans make up almost half the number of migrants to Fort McMurray, followed by 17% of people originating from the province of Newfoundland and Labrador.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_McMurray,_Alberta