Turner Valley Gas plant - Diversion work underway

Heavy machinery has begun the task of rerouting the Sheep River 50 metres away from the Turner Valley Gas Plant.
Iron Horse Earthworks, a Calgary company which was awarded the contract in late February, has completed 25 per cent of the project to date.
Erosion groynes, designed to stop the river bank from eroding is close to completion. This weekend large trucks were dropping loads of large boulders along the river bank closest to the plant.
In addition, excavation of the new channel has begun.
The diversion project is expected to cost $174,000. The diversion work is being funded by $1.5 million which was reallocated by the province to cleanup the site. Another $400,000 is being sought to build a containment wall along the river bank and install an advanced water monitoring system.
The river will be diverted back to its path prior to a 1996 flood.
Since 1996 the river bank has been moving steadily towards the gas plant.
Last spring a large runoff caused the bank to erode to the point that it came in contact with contaminants, such as hydrocarbons, found in the ground water at the site.
However, the province’s monitoring system has not detected a level of contaminants that exceeds provincial standards.
The Turner Valley Gas Plant is a historic site, owned by the federal government and operated by Alberta Community Development.


By Darlene Casten
Staff reporter

From, The OKOTOKS WESTERN WHEEL, March 10, 2004