Coal development brings with it significant environmental concerns around habitat loss (especially for species at risk) and impacts on water and fisheries. As an important component of addressing the environmental impacts associated with coal exploration and development, the ELC would like to see a strong commitment by the Government of Alberta to achieving the many recommendations of the Coal Policy Committee. This includes dedicated effort and fulsome public consultation to complete regional planning under the Alberta Land Stewardship Act to guide coal exploration and development decisions. In our view, making a few adjustments to existing legislation without public input is not adequate to the task of addressing concerns with the extensive surface disturbances and water contamination associated with coal development.
Coal Policy in Alberta: A Brief History
The 1976 Coal Development Policy for Alberta established four public land use categories for the purposes of coal exploration and development in the Eastern Slopes of the Rocky Mountains. On category 1 lands, no exploration or commercial development is allowed. Lands in categories 2, 3 or 4 are not automatically open to exploration and lands in categories 3 or 4 are not automatically open to development. Rather, the Coal Policy requires that particular care be taken to review applications for exploration and/or development in productive or potentially productive agricultural areas.
After a brief rescission of the Coal Policy in 2020, the Coal Policy was reinstated and the four public land use categories remain in place. In late 2024, the Government of Alberta announced the Coal Industry Modernization Initiative (CIMI) which seems to be focused on discrete amendments to existing legislation rather than undertaking comprehensive land use planning to direct coal exploration and development in the Eastern Slopes.
Habitat Loss associated with Coal Development
Coal mining may occur via surface operations (in a mountainous region such as the Eastern Slopes this is often referred to as mountaintop removal) or via underground operations. The surface impacts of surface mining are patently obvious as surface material is removed to expose and extract buried coal resources, and vast amounts of waste rock are created.[1] Surface mining reshapes landscapes: removing vegetation, transforming watersheds, and eliminating wildlife habitat. A 2024 paper by Colin A. Cooke et al. also found that the impacts of surface mining are not limited to the immediate mine site but result in contamination far from the source in the form of water pollution and fugitive coal dust and other atmospheric contaminants.[2]
It is also important to note that subsurface coal mining is not without surface impacts. A recent study by Xuwen Tian et al. found that “underground mining activities have significant negative impacts on the geological environment of mountainous areas, leading to various geological hazards on the surface, such as subsidence, ground fissures, rock falls, landslides and debris flows”[3] These impacts were found to continue even when after coal mining operations ceased.[4] Furthermore, even subsurface operations will require surface level disruptions to accommodate infrastructure such as roads and access points. All this contributes to habitat loss and fragmentation.
We note that the CIMI Information Sheet published by the Alberta Government on December 23, 2024 indicates that mountaintop removal will not be permitted as a coal mining technique and that no new open-pit coal mines will be permitted in the Eastern Slopes. But there is currently no definition for mountaintop removal in the Coal Conservation Act(CCA)or its regulations. As well, banning open pit mines does not equate to a ban on surface mining as section 1 of the CCA defines two types of surface mining: open pit mines and strip mines. The term “open pit mine” means “a mine worked by removal of overlying strata and subsequent excavation of exposed coal in terrain that is not flat or substantially flat” whereas a strip mine is essentially the same technique but on “a flat or substantially flat terrain”. Clarity is needed as to what exactly is being proposed as part of the CIMI in terms of permissible mining techniques. This is separate from the question of whether new coal mining operations are even acceptable within the Eastern Slopes.
Water Contamination associated with Coal Development
The Eastern Slopes plays a critical role in watershed health as the headwaters of the South Saskatchewan River Basin which includes the Oldman, Bow and South Saskatchewan rivers and of the Peace-Athabasca River Basin (see the Alberta Wilderness Association website and the University of Alberta’s Southern Rockies Watershed Project). According to Alberta Innovates, more than 90% of water that Albertans drink or use for irrigation comes from the Eastern Slopes. The waters of the Eastern Slopes also provide habitat for numerous aquatic species including bull trout, rainbow trout, rocky mountain sculpin and westslope cutthroat trout, all of which are at risk species (see Rocky Mountains’ eastern slopes priority place on the Canada Department of Fisheries and Oceans website).
Water – clearly essential for both ecological and human health – is known to be significantly impacted by coal mining activities. Research by Cooke, Emerson and Drevnick found lasting downstream impacts on water from abandoned and reclaimed coal mines in Alberta (i.e. Tent Mountain which is partially reclaimed and Grassy Mountain).[5] Elevated levels of sediment, selenium, lead, carbon, nitrogen and polycyclic aromatic compounds that tracked the mining history of Tent Mountain were found.[6] As well, episodic discharge of mine water from abandoned underground adits at Grassy Mountain caused periodic increases in iron, metals and suspended sediment.[7]
The release of selenium from waste rock generated by coal mining is also a known problem. Studies have found that past coal developments in both BC and AB appear to have resulted in selenium concentrations exceeding guideline levels for aquatic health.[8] Recent research by Cooke et al. has found that, even decades after closure, waste rock from surface mining at the summit or along the summit ridge of a mountain (sometimes called mountaintop removal mining) continues to leach selenium and other pollutants.[9] As stated by Cooke et al., the “inputs of these pollutants can have devastating consequences for downstream fish communities and the ecosystems they inhabit. This is especially true for selenium, which bioaccumulates and biomagnifies through food webs”.[10] Aside from impacts on fish health and mortality, there are human health concerns for those who consume fish with elevated selenium levels.[11]
With the Eastern Slope’s critical role in watershed health and as habitat for endangered and threatened aquatic species, the potential for selenium and other pollution associated with coal development is troubling to say the least. The release of selenium is an ongoing problem which has not yet been adequately addressed which raises the question of how new coal developments will control selenium release (is an economically viable technology available?). Given the known long-term risks of water pollution associated with coal mining activities, it raises the question of the wisdom of allowing such activities in the Eastern Slopes (especially with the continuing effects of legacy sites).
Coal Development without adequate Land-Use Planning
Without high-level policy protections in place, cumulative impacts on the Eastern Slopes cannot be effectively managed using a project-by-project approval approach. The Alberta Land Stewardship Act (ALSA) enables regional planning which could be used to create and implement policy protections on a regional basis, addressing cumulative impacts within the lands covered by the Coal Policy. It is also possible that a subregional plan to specifically address impacts around coal exploration and development in the regional could be created and implemented. To date, neither has happened.
While the South Saskatchewan Regional Plan (SSRP) covers some parts of the Eastern Slopes, it does not encompass all lands that fall under the land use categories of the Coal Policy. The majority of category 2 and 3 lands are not yet subject to a regional plan under ALSA. Furthermore, the SSRP states with respect to the Coal Policy (page 61):
As part of reviewing and incorporating the Integrated Resource Plans, the government will integrate a review of the coal categories, established by the 1976 A Coal Development Policy for Alberta to confirm whether these land classifications specific to coal exploration and development should remain in place or be adjusted. The review of the coal categories will only be for the South Saskatchewan planning region. The intent is for the SSRP and implementation strategies of the regional plan or future associated subregional or issue-specific plans within the region to supersede the coal categories for the purposes of land use decisions about where coal exploration and development can and cannot occur in the planning region.
This indicates that the SSRP was developed with knowledge of the existing Coal Policy land use categories and with recognition that a substantive review of the same was necessary.
ELC’s Recommendations for Stronger Policy and Planning
The Coal Policy Committee recommended that coal exploration and development be guided by ALSA regional and subregional plans. The Committee further stated that these plans should be completed before any major coal project approvals are considered. This would enable consideration of cumulative impacts and other priorities within the Eastern Slopes (as opposed to project-by-project approvals which tend to be limited in this regard).
A renewed commitment to regional planning with subregional planning to specifically guide coal exploration and development decisions, with clear consideration and protection for species at risk and their habitat. This commitment needs to go beyond the statement made in the CIMI Information Sheet that regional plans “have the potential to set out management direction regarding where and under what conditions coal leasing, exploration and development may be pursued”.[12] Regional plans should be completed and should include clear, regulatory requirements that delineate which areas are and are not open to coal exploration and development, as well as appropriate restrictions where coal activities are permitted. It is unlikely that coal resources can be responsibly developed in areas where there are species at risk whose recovery would be further jeopardized by coal development activities whether by surface disturbances or impacts on water. These regional plans need to be developed with fulsome and extensive public participation to realize the potential of regional planning.
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[1] Colin A. Cooke et al., “Mountaintop Removal Coal Mining Contaminates Snowpack across a Broad Region” (2024) 58 Environ. Sci. Technol. 11718.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Xuwen Tian, Xin Yao, Zhenjiang Zhou and Tao Tao, “Surface Multi-Hazard Effects of Underground Coal Mining in Mountainous Regions” (2025) 17 Remote Sens. 122 at 2.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Colin A. Cooke, Craig A. Emmerton and Paul E. Drevnick, “Legacy coal mining impacts downstream ecosystems for decades in the Canadian Rockies” (2024) 344 Environmental Pollution 123328.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Bob Weber “Contaminant from coal mines already high in some Alberta rivers: unreported data”, January 25, 2021
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/selenium-alberta-coal-mines-contamination-1.5886293; also see Bob Weber “Coal company Teck fined $60M for contaminating rivers in southeastern B.C.”, March 26, 2021. Canadian Press. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/teck-fined-60m-contaminating-bc-rivers-1.5965646.
[9] Colin A. Cooke et al., “Fish remain high in selenium long after mountaintop coal mines close” (May 27, 2025), https://doi.org/10.1101/2025.05.22.655156.
[10] Ibid at lines 41 to 43.
[11] Ibid.
[12] CIMI Information Sheet at 3.