Success story
New Solutions for Shell Canada
Intro
Shell Canada has incorporated Earth Observation data into its Sustainable Development Report, demonstrating the potential of satellites to provide a global and cost-effective way to measure objectively the sustainability of business activities.
Background project
Companies that aim to create wealth while also contributing to the long-term quality of life and respect for the environment regularly issue environmental audits of their Corporate Sustainable Development (CSD) activities and report on the 'triple bottom line' of economic, social and environmental impacts. In order to quantify sustainability, accurate and timely information on the state of the environment is needed, which Earth Observation (EO) from space can provide.
Issue and needs
Under the ESA project, Hatfield Consultants, an environmental consultancy firm based in Canada, led a team working with Shell Canada and Albian Sands Energy to provide EO-based geo-information to support environmental management and monitoring related to the exploitation of their Athabasca oil sands located in the north of the province of Alberta. Occupying some 141 000 sq km, the Athabasca oil sands are estimated to be the second largest known oil reserves in the world after Saudi Arabia.
Proposed solution
EO provides objective coverage across both space and time, EO images show the world through a wide-enough frame so that complete large-scale phenomena can be observed with great accuracy. Satellites also remain in place for long periods, making them able to highlight environmental changes occurring gradually. The focus of the satellite data used in this project was to help quantify habitat change in various ways and to understand how a habitat may be influenced by the oil sand operations.
Industry perspective
According to Shell, the images allowed them to monitor vegetation, track land use changes, capture roads, power lines and other installations that can fragment habitat. They also provide them with the capability to establish baseline environmental information before developing new areas.