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Smeared across Alberta sit 63,000 abandoned oil and gas wells, a number that has ballooned as the price of oil deflates.

The discards have been in the making since the 1950s, when a lack of environmental regulations truly gave meaning to the term “Wild West.” Even if no more new wells are put into production, it could take up to 30 years to clean up what are known as “orphan wells,” which are today usually offspring of small-time mom and pop operators who go belly up.

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A former reclamation inspector with the Alberta government told me that Alberta’s oil and gas well sectors aren’t subject to the strict regulatory approvals or high-level policing that exist for the oil sands. Proof came on Aug. 28, when the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) took a bold step and ordered Nexen to immediately stop operating 95 pipelines after a July spill of five million litres of oil.

“It’s like death by a million slices. No one wants to talk about it. There are endless amounts of spills out there,” the former inspector said.