Innovation Anthology #232:

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Beavers are nature’s engineers. And in the forest, beaver dams create ponds and help shape how the land drains.

That’s why reclamation scientists at Syncrude Canada decided to study what beavers do.

Ron Lewko leads the Environmental Research Team at Syncrude.

RON LEWKO: We learned quite a bit. We looked at over 784 dams and flew over them with helicopters to look at how they are engineering the landscape. And based on that, we’re using that knowledge to enhance our drainage plans and to make a more sustainable closure plan.

According to Ron Lewko, beavers and their waterworks attract biodiversity, which is good when rebuilding the landscape after mining the oil sands

RON LEWKO: So the closure plan is our plan once mining and upgrading activity is done, what the landscape is going to look like as we turn it back to nature. The baseline is a drainage plan, but incorporates all aspects of land form design, reintroducing biodiversity, native plants and shrubs. So all the aspects of reclamation are put into one plan.

Ron Lewko says it takes about fifteen years to reestablish the forest ecosystem in a reclaimed site.

Thanks today to Syncrude Canada.

I’M CHERYL CROUCHER

Guest

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Sponsor

Syncrude

Program Date: 2009-06-09