EDMONTON - Pressure over environmental concerns has forced
Germany's largest scientific organization to pull out of joint
research with Alberta on better ways to upgrade oilsands
bitumen. German scientists with the Helmholtz-Alberta Initiative
will no longer work on such projects, Bernd Schneider, lead
scientific co-ordinator for the Helmholtz Association, said
Tuesday. "This bitumen upgrading will now be quitted," Schneider
said from Potsdam, Germany. The initiative was created in 2011
with a five-year, $25-million commitment from the Alberta
government, in addition to other funding. The plan was to bring
together the University of Alberta and one of Europe's largest
scientific groups to improve environmental and engineering
performance in the oilsands. The German share of the research
funding is eight million euros over five years. The initiative
focuses on topics including waste-water management, carbon
capture, geothermal power and land reclamation. It also
researches better ways to upgrade bitumen — a su