Wednesday, May 28, 2025
The Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) recently issued an abandonment order to Sunshine Oilsands Ltd. (Sunshine), requiring the company to submit and implement approved plans to abandon and reclaim its sites.
The AER issued this order following Sunshine’s failure to comply with previous orders from November 2024 and February 2025. All three orders are available on the AER’s Compliance Dashboard.
On November 14, 2024, the AER issued an order to Sunshine due to concerns that it was unable to provide reasonable care and measures at its sites and a high risk of being unable to meet its regulatory obligations.
On February 24, 2025, the AER issued another order directing the Orphan Well Association (OWA) to manage all Sunshine-licensed sites for eight weeks to ensure public safety and environmental protection.
The abandonment order ensures that sites licensed to Sunshine do not pose a risk to public safety or the environment, and that specified land is conserved and reclaimed. The OWA retains care and custody of Sunshine’s sites to ensure public safety and environmental protection. The order requires Sunshine to provide an abandonment plan for its wells and facilities. The AER must approve the plan before Sunshine can implement it. Sunshine remains the licensee of record.
As one of the largest independent developers of oil sands leases by land holdings in the Athabasca region, Sunshine owns and controls 100 per cent of 467,969 hectares of leases (over 1,000,000 acres of leases) and holds approximately seven per cent of the allocated oil sands lease area in that region. Sunshine holds a premier land position that includes eight primary operational areas and has the expertise to extract significant value from its assets. Its principal operating regions in the Athabasca area are at West Ells, Thickwood, Legend Lake, Harper, Muskwa, Goffer and Portage.
The Canadian oil sands comprise the largest single source of supply of oil imported into the United States.
