Cleanup completed, but doubts remain

Okotoks Western Wheel
July 2, 2008 Vol 33 No 43

By Tamara Neely
Staff Reporter

The buildings, the equipment and the earthen flare still burning at the Turner Valley Gas Plant are souvenirs of a period when the facility was a pioneer in the oil and gas industry in Canada.
Two men who got their start in the energy sector at the plant are still living in the area, and both think a museum and interpretive centre at the old plant is a great idea for keeping its history alive.
However, based on their memories of the place, they’d like to see more clean up done before tourists start flooding into an interpretive centre and museum on the site.
Hartell resident John Bowman remembers when his dad lit a gas flare that continues to burn at the site of the Turner Valley Gas Plant. It was 1977, and his father, Jack, was the supervisor of a team digging a trench in the riverbed to install underground piping to transport water to the plant. They unearthed a source of gas that was a fraction sour, making the workers sick.
“Everybody (all the workers) was complaining about headaches, so dad said, ‘Everybody stand back,’ and he lit it,” said Bowman.
That flare is now the renowned flame at Hell’s
Half Acre.
Bowman and his brother Al both got their start in the oil patch working at the gas plant, Bowman at age 14. The summer job turned into a lifelong career including four years inside the plant and another 16 in the field, from the 1960s to the 1980s. He did maintenance, operated the compressor and propane plants, filled the propane truck and loaded sulphur.
“It was a good job, it paid well,” said Bowman. “It was a great experience. If you liked it, you worked there and didn’t worry about it.”
Keeping the workplace clean was part of all the gas plant employees’ daily routines. Bowman said everybody was given a portion of the plant that they were responsible for, and had to wash the floor and equipment in their section every day and keep it painted.
“You kept it painted and clean and looking good – everybody went around mopping up drips and drops and kept it clean,” said Bowman. “It was so clean you could eat off it. Everybody took pride in their job. You hear a lot of horror stories about the place, but a lot of it is (crap).”
Bowman said he favours reopening the site so long as there is no worry about pollution and health problems.
“I suspect, from working there, that it isn’t all clean from end to end and side to side,” said Bowman. “It’d be okay if everything’s done right as far as cleaned up so there’s no worry about pollution and health problems.”
Turner Valley Coun. George Wallace also worked at the gas plant, and also thinks re-opening the gas plant to share Turner Valley’s pivotal role in the oil and gas industry in Canada is a good idea. Like Bowman, Wallace said he thinks more cleanup needs to be done before that can happen.
Wallace said he is concerned about all the drips and drops of machine lubrication that could have escaped the employees’ efforts to keep the place clean.
Wallace worked at the gas plant for four years. A journeyman pipe fitter, Wallace started at the plant working as a field operator overseeing the connections between the gas wells in the field and the gas plant, then worked as an operator in the propane plant.
Like Bowman and the other employees, he did maintenance, too. His recollection is that a lot of motor oil leaked from the machinery, and unlike Bowman, he is concerned about how it has contaminated the ground underneath the buildings.
Wallace estimated there were approximately eight compressors that held 25 gallons of oil each and that they leaked over a 50-year span.
“It gets through the cracks in the cement and underneath and I don’t see how they could clean that all up without moving the building,” said Wallace.
His concerns about contamination go beyond the unknown below the buildings.
“I don’t know that I can recommend people go there with the hazards I believe that are there – there’s lots of asbestos, the ground leaks gas there, just like it does outside where it’s burning,” said Wallace. “So there’s some form of (sour) gas on the site all the time, whether you like it or not.”
Evidence of active gas on the site, for example, is in the bubbles coming up from the ground when it rains, Wallace said.
“You can still smell it, and I worked there, and there’s a pretty good chance they didn’t get all (the contamination), based on my knowledge of the past and what I’ve seen them do there,” said Wallace. “There’s definitely contamination inside the border, that nice little berm they just built all the way around to protect it.”
The provincial government announced earlier this month that $2 million would be used to help transform the gas plant into an tourist site.
The extent of the proposed renovations were not confirmed. A report completed last fall stated renovating the gas plant into a historical museum and interpretive centre could cost up to $ 7 million.