The Long Lake facility operated by Nexen Energy was ordered to stop the operation of 95 pipelines due to recent environmental concerns. The company is closing the entire facility down as a result, because they say it is not possible to comply with the suspension order any other way due to the close integration of the affected pipeline infrastructure to the operations that take place at the Long Lake facility. The suspension of the 95 pipeline operations was ordered by the Alberta Energy Regulator, and Nexen has not given any time line about when the facility will be reopened. The company says it may take up to 2 weeks to completely shut down all of the facility operations.

Nexen spokesperson Diane Kossman discussed the Long Lake facility shut down and said in an email that “because of the complex and integrated nature of our Long Lake operations we’re complying with the suspension order, including providing them with necessary documentation, suspending our pipelines, and shutting down our Long Lake oil sands operations.” Bob Curran, the spokesperson for the Alberta Energy Regulator, explained that even if this was known to the regulator the same decision to suspend operations would have been made. “It would have been irrelevant to our decision making. We didn’t feel the assurance we needed regarding those pipelines. Any associated impacts are irrelevant to this decision.” The suspension will not be lifted by the regulator until the company can prove that they have the capability of maintaining the safety of the pipelines involved and the company has provided sufficient documentation in order to convince the regulator of this.