The co-importance of physical mixing and biogeochemical consumption in controlling water cap oxygen levels in Base Mine Lake

Bitumen extraction in the Athabasca oil sands region of Alberta Canada has resulted in 1 billion m3 of tailings. Base Mine Lake (BML), the first commercial-scale pit lake (PL) in the Alberta oil sands, is currently being assessed as a potential fluid fine tailings (FFT) reclamation strategy. Here, field-based, BML water cap depth-dependent oxygen consumption rate (OCR) determination, geochemical characterization and modelling of physical mixing …