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Suncor’s fleet of automated heavy hauler trucks is meeting company expectations. The fleet, which is already Canada’s largest fleet of autonomous vehicles, is on schedule for expansion.

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As of May, Suncor’s base plant north of Fort McMurray has 45 haul trucks driven by a network of sensors, lasers and GPS. Suncor spokesperson Leithan Slade says the company is on track to have 91 of these vehicles by the end of the year.

The technology–which Suncor calls Autonomous Haulage Systems (AHS)– is a natural evolution for the oilsands, said Suncor vice president Greg Fuhr. The technology’s slow rollout helped Suncor to avoid massive layoffs and sudden changes to clear way for them. As technology in the oilsands changes, new jobs will be made and existing jobs will adapt.

“Every truck does exactly the same thing all the time. It goes exactly where it’s told. It doesn’t need a break except for refueling,” said Fuhr in an interview.

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“What you get is the consistency, the reproducibility and the ability to see and adjust, in real time, an entire system in a very predictable fashion.”

Other companies are also investing in the technology. Imperial Oil’s heavy hauler fleet at its Kearl operation became fully automated last October. However, Suncor is the largest company in the oilsands and Fort McMurray’s biggest employer.

Labour and union leaders in Fort McMurray and across Alberta know automation in most fields is inevitable. But how it is being introduced makes them worry for the flesh and blood workers and the places they call home.

Autonomous fleet more than a decade in the making

Suncor was the first oilsands company to embrace automation after launching a 2013 trial program with an automated hauler at the North Steepbank mine. A company spokesperson at the time said the technology was being studied because of a skilled worker shortage in the oilsands. Suncor’s leadership was inspired by the automated haulers used by mining companies in Australia and Chile.

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When global oil prices collapsed in late 2014, cutting spending and keeping production high became Suncor’s main challenge. Automation and its impacts on staffing, maintenance, safety and performance became a priority.

Suncor announced in 2018 it would add 150 autonomous haulers to its operations. Mark Little, Suncor’s chief operations officer at the time, said the news represented “the largest investments in electric autonomous vehicles in the world.”

About 100 new jobs would be added and 400 jobs would be lost, said Little. Fuhr says trucks came online as workers left through attrition, transfers and retirements. Temporary and contract workers were hired to avoid heavily impacting permanent staff.

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“We’ve managed this. We’ve been very open with the workforce for years on this and managed our hiring practices,” said Fuhr.

“As we roll through these stages of autonomous implementation, we are not going to be laying off or having any impact on our permanent workforce here in Fort McMurray.”

A July statement from Suncor says the technology is meeting company expectations. Potential injuries, incident rates and equipment stoppages have dropped at sites with the automated haulers. The vehicles are doing well in unpredictable weather. Their artificial intelligence has reduced wear and tear on components.

“The collaboration and efforts that have gone towards AHS, from road maintenance to dispatch, have allowed the fleet to literally roll-out smoothly and safely while increasing productivity on site,” said the statement.

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Fort McMurray needs to discuss automation impacts: labour leaders

Yet, Fuhr’s comments and Suncor’s results haven’t soothed fears from a worried labour movement. A group of Fort McMurray union leaders meeting with senators last month painted a bleak picture of Fort McMurray.

They feared an emptying as their workplaces are staffed by skeleton crews of commuters, cheap temporary foreign workers and robots. Suncor’s automated fleet was mentioned frequently with disdain and worry.

Omer Hussein, president of the Wood Buffalo and District Labour Council, worries many companies are not properly training or supporting workers as their jobs are replaced or augmented by automation and A.I. Even if automation creates new jobs, Hussein argues it still means fewer workers living in Fort McMurray.

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“This is going to have a long-lasting impact on taxation, on the municipality and on the region in general. That’s something that’s not talked about enough, but this is going to mean a significant shift in the way this town operates,” he said.

Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, acknowledged the safety and performance benefits of automation and A.I. How they are deployed is a concern workers across industries have, he said.

“At the end of the day, they’re profit-seeking businesses. If they can maintain or increase their production and generate profits with fewer people, that’s exactly what they’re going to do,” said McGowan in an interview.

“We probably can’t stop it and we shouldn’t try to stop it, but we do have to have conversations about how we can maintain our living standards and make sure working people aren’t left behind.”

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Most human drivers not going anywhere

Suncor’s current automation plans extend only towards heavy haulers. The company still needs a pulse behind the wheel of shovels, graders, excavators, bulldozers, busses and other vehicles crisscrossing the Suncor’s sites. Drivers and dispatchers have been trained how to interact with the automated vehicles.

Keyano College is not worried about robots taking over human drivers anytime soon. A $766,000 federal grant in June bought two haul truck simulators for its driver training program, bringing its total to six. The college also has six simulators for other vehicles used in mining and construction.

Darren Stacey, the dean for Keyano’s school of trades and technology, says qualified drivers are still in high demand in those industries. Some companies are not yet prepared to switch to autonomous vehicles. Some never will. Meanwhile, most graduates are still finding employment.

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But for McGowan, Hussein and other labour leaders, it’s hard to forget when Kieron McFayden, a former executive vice president with Cenovus, mused in 2018 “if we can put production systems on the seabed, we can de-man the oilsands.” A company spokesperson later said McFayden was making “very general comments.”

Fuhr says the oilsands is decades away from that technology being a reality. For now, Suncor has no similar massive technology changes planned for operations or its workforce. Even if it did, preparing for and implementing those changes is a long and expensive process.

“What drives us is we have to have a strong Suncor in order to be a strong contributor to the community. That’s really what our thrust is here. How do we maintain our competitiveness so we’ll be here for decades to come to support the community?” he said.

“Even autonomous systems are not one person working on it, there’s a lot of people working on this.”

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