Department of Fisheries & Oceans Arctic Information Survey – Gray Literature January 2000 Peter Devenis and Associates Spill Response & Emergency Management Specialists Department of Fisheries & Oceans Arctic Information Survey – Gray Literature January 2000 DFO – Arctic Information Survey ADDENDUM Petro-Canada After the electronic version of this report was prepared and submitted to DFO, we were finally able to obtain in March approval from Petro-Canada to review their materials. We met with Petro-Canada and were given a copy of their initial search results. This was provided to allow us to review and possibly provide further direction on a more detailed review at the next stage of the project. As noted in the body of the report, Petro-Canada still maintains an interest in the Mackenzie Valley of the Northwest Territories and also had some questions about the confidential nature of some files and reports. In addition to the search words provided earlier, Petro-Canada also conducted a search on their project areas. There were a total of 748 publications found from the combined searches. There were 551 citations found for Arctic; 48 for Beaufort; 29 for Mackenzie Delta; 89 for Northwest Territories; and 31 for Yukon. In terms of the scope of the titles, following are some of the key topics uncovered: · Arctic Environmental Observations · Arctic Pilot Project files · Ocean Current Research reports · Drifting Buoy reports · Ice movement studies · Marine Mammal movement reports · Whale noise studies · Environmental Impact Statements - various · Arctic Islands study files A copy of the search printouts is now provided as a separate attachment in the Appendices. There was no firm opinion expressed on the issue of donating further materials to the Arctic Institute of North America. The idea of preserving and rescuing important Arctic information though was of some interest to Petro-Canada. As with other companies, it was felt this should be discussed further at the next stage of the DFO project. Page i DFO – Arctic Information Survey Table of Contents Table of Contents ADDENDUM...........................................................................................i Table of Contents ....................................................................ii 1. Summary – Findings and Recommendations .............................................1 Key Findings..........................................................................................1 Recommendations .................................................................................2 2. Background and Objectives.............4 Background..........................................................................................4 Objectives and Outcomes ...................................................................5 3. Summary of Holdings ..............................6 Amoco Canada / Dome / Canmar...........................................................7 Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers .......................................7 Chevron Canada....................................................................................8 Gulf Canada Resources / BeauDril.........................................................9 Husky Oil .............................................................................................11 Imperial Oil / Esso................................................................................12 Mobil Oil Canada .................................................................................12 Petro-Canada ......................................................................................13 Shell Canada .......................................................................................14 Suncor / Sun Oil...................................................................................15 TransCanada Transmission (Pipelines) ................................................16 4. Organizations Contacted ...................17 5. Appendices........................................................21 Appendix 1: Results of Company Surveys............22 Page ii DFO – Arctic Information Survey 1. Summary – Findings and Recommendations 1. Summary – Findings and Recommendations The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has an initiative to preserve environmental, scientific, and social-cultural studies and reports for energy development in the Canadian Arctic, and more particularly the Beaufort Sea. As part of this ongoing effort, DFO wanted to determine the scope of records in the possession of energy companies, and government agencies and departments. Under contract to DFO, PetroGlobe (Canada) Ltd. was to survey relevant energy companies regarding existing records for the Canadian arctic, and the Beaufort Sea. A further part of the project was to obtain an indication of the willingness to transfer relevant records to the Arctic Institute of North America Collection within the University of Calgary Library. Peter Devenis of Peter Devenis and Associates was tasked to complete this preliminary survey of unpublished gray literature pertinent to oil and gas exploration in the Canadian Arctic. This report provides a summary of the survey conducted and the results obtained. Key Findings Various companies were contacted and the status of their Arctic information queried. The essential findings are summarized below: à Generally there was a good deal of interest expressed in the survey work by almost all the companies à The survey is timely in that for some of the companies interest is gaining / re-emerging for Arctic energy work à There was a significant amount of files and records still being retained by some of the companies contacted – notably Gulf and Shell à There were no clear decisions made when companies were queried about donations – this would require further review and approvals Page 1 DFO – Arctic Information Survey 1. Summary – Findings and Recommendations à At the time of filing this report we were unable to access some of the company collections – due to non-response and non-authorization (Petro- Canada and Imperial Oil) à The Arctic Institute of North America and other agencies have received collections from some of the companies contacted à The in-house materials that we were able to review seems to be a mix of public and proprietary information covering a wide-range of Arctic topics Recommendations As a result of the survey, there are some next-step recommendations that we would make. These recommendations include: à Based on the amount of material uncovered, we would recommend proceeding with further cataloguing and pursuing some key company collections à The next stage of the study should focus on those companies identified that have a significant volume of collections à This next stage would involve reviewing and cataloguing in detail the major collections accessible and determining their relevance à This next stage should be focused, with clear objectives on cataloguing information and how it will be used à As the majority of companies did not explicitly say no to donating materials, we believe this issue warrants further discussion and encouragement with those companies à Pursuit of Imperial Oil and Petro-Canada collections should be continued because of the potential amount of information contained. Perhaps by restating the benefits and providing information on confidentiality and use of the results a more positive response can be obtained à Because of the interest expressed in this study, DFO should clarify and make known to those companies how this report will be used and distributed à Because of the nature of the industry at this time with renewed interest in the Arctic, there is a need for a DFO policy on sharing of information and reports uncovered. This revolves around the issue of confidentiality of the information– how to share and how to proceed further Page 2 DFO – Arctic Information Survey 1. Summary – Findings and Recommendations à Several companies mentioned their willingness to participate and they understood the needs of the study – however they felt constrained to help because of the issue of time and manpower to conduct searches. The next stage of the study should take into account this manpower need Page 3 DFO – Arctic Information Survey 2. Background and Objectives 2. Background and Objectives Background The Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has catalogued and created bibliographic data bases for coastal zone planning in Cumberland Sound and Yukon North Slope (1996) and for identified issues in Hudson's Bay (1999). The department has worked with Environment Canada and contractors to assemble published and unpublished reports concerning oil spill research, spill prevention and emergency preparedness in the Canadian Arctic under the Brander-Smith Program (1996-97). DFO has also catalogued and abstracted 900 reports on Arctic physical and biological oceanography in conjunction with the Arctic Institute of North America (1998). For the period 1999 to 2002, the DFO has hired a cataloguer to develop a database of records for integrated oceans management to provide government and the public with access to the DFO library. Since 1999, over 2600 documents have been catalogued, with 2300 entries being placed in the electronically searchable WAVES collection. DFO is continuing this initiative to preserve records of scientific, environmental and social-cultural studies and reports for energy development in the Canadian Arctic and the Beaufort Sea. As part of this ongoing effort, DFO wanted to determine