Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Alberta, 2009. / Title from PDF file main screen (viewed on Feb. 19, 2010). A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Geotechnical Engineering, [Department of] Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Alberta. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M. Sc.)--University of Alberta, 2009. / Title from pdf file main screen (viewed on Sept. 1, 2009). "A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Chemical Engineering, Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, University of Alberta." Includes bibliographical references.

Research Project (M.R.M.) - Simon Fraser University, 2005. / Research Project (School of Resource and Environmental Management) / Simon Fraser University.

Reclaimed oil sands landscapes are perceived to be low in plant diversity compared with naturally occurring plant communities. Approximately 66 Carex species inhabit the oil sand region. This thesis is unique and represents the first large scale study of Carex establishment on reclaimed oil sands landscapes. Research compared diversity and habitat variables between natural ecosystems and reclaimed landscapes, and examined the colonization mechanism for Carex establishment on reclaimed landscapes (i.e., ingress from adjacent natural ecosystems or emergence from the soil seed bank). Low positive associations between the presence of Carex in natural and reclaimed landscapes, and the presence of species on reclaimed landscapes not accounted for in either the forest or edge plots, suggests Carex established from the soil seed bank and less so from natural ingress. Carex share the same seed dispersal mechanisms as many plants, so the implications may apply to a broader range of plant species.

This interdisciplinary project offers new insights into the reclamation history of two of the most controversial and contaminated sites in Canadian history: the Sydney tar ponds and coke ovens and the Athabasca oil sands. It argues that Canada’s natural resource-dependent economy, combined with jurisdictional uncertainty, created a hesitant, fragmentary site cleanup regime, one that left room for different ideas about landscapes to shape and even distort reclamation’s goals and processes. In the absence of substantive reclamation standards and legislation, researchers struggled to accommodate the unique challenges of the oil sands during the 1960s and 1970s. Ambitious goals for reclamation faltered, and even the most successful examples of oil sands reclamation differed significantly from the pre-extraction environment; reclamation was not restoration. Planners envisioned transforming northeastern Alberta into a managed wilderness and recreation nirvana, but few of these plans were realised. The Sydney tar ponds experience suggests that truly successful reclamation cannot exist unless past injustices are fully acknowledged, reparations made, and a more complete narrative of contamination and reclamation constructed through open deliberation. Reclamation, after all, does not repair history; nor can it erase the past. Effective oil sands reclamation, then, requires a reconsideration of the site’s past and an acknowledgement of the perpetuated vulnerabilities and injustices wrought by development and reclamation.