Message from the Chair

Welcome to the RAMP website.

 

RAMP continues to evolve to ensure its water monitoring in the Athabasca region contributes to a better understanding of the cumulative aquatic effects of resource development in the Athabasca region. Our organization is taking a number of steps to further the science in this area by sharing, and improving upon, the comprehensive data we’ve collected since RAMP was formed in 1997.

This includes providing access to the complete RAMP database. We have created a publicly-accessible database containing the 15 years’ worth of aquatic monitoring data we’ve collected in the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo.

Via our website, users can access our environmental data management system which holds more than two million data records related to RAMP’s ongoing monitoring of climate and hydrology, water quality, benthic invertebrate communities, sediment quality, fish populations, and lakes sensitive to acidity.

This powerful database is a key tool used by RAMP to identify and evaluate any changes to the aquatic environment in the Athabasca oil sands region, and we believe access to this data will be useful for other groups and individuals interested in tracking water quality in the region and any effects of resource development on that water quality.

RAMP has recently published the findings of its latest peer review, along with our response to the findings contained in that report, on its website. The peer review report suggests more work needs to be done in the area of aquatic monitoring in the Lower Athabasca region. RAMP will continue to incorporate such input into its program planning.

 

 

The RAMP Steering Committee is the multi-stakeholder decision body of RAMP responsible for the management and implementation of the program.