"The development of tar sand resources in the arid western United States will require large amounts of water for most proposed production processes. Due to the scarcity of available water and because nearly all river basins in the western US are presently overappropriated, the recycling and reuse of wastewaters from the production process will be necessary. The recycling and reuse of this wastewater will be dependent on the cost of treating the wastewater to raise its quality to an acceptable level for its intended use. Research efforts at the Western Research Institute and elsewhere have completed much of the basic laboratory evaluation necessary to establish whether tar sand wastewater produced from in situ recovery processes can be treated. Additionally, standard industrial treatment practices exist for in situ steam drive tar sand production and surface hot water separation processes. These practices have been developed for the commercial production facilities located in northern Alberta, Canada, which first began operation in 1967."