Category: Canada

Quebec police have finished and filed with authorities their investigation into the Lac-Megantic train disaster that killed 47 people and prompted backlash against the growing practice of transporting crude oil by rail. The report has been sent to Quebec provincial prosecutors, said Claude Denis, a spokesman for Quebec’s provincial police service. A story by the QMI news service on March 22, citing an unidentified police source, said the train’s engineer knew some of the train’s brakes were broken and that police expected prosecutors to file criminal charges. In July 2013, a train operated by closely held Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway Ltd. rolled downhill into the small […]

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Canadian Finance Minister Joe Oliver told members of a Chinese trade group his country has the reserves available to meet growing energy demands. Oliver told members of the Canada-China Chamber of Industry and Commerce Association diversification of Canada’s export economy was a win-win situation for both sides. "Canada has the resources China needs," he said in a keynote address Wednesday. "We are an energy partner that China can depend on for the long term." Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper last week signed a free-trade agreement with South Korea. That deal is part of his administration’s effort to diversify an export economy that relies almost exclusively on the United States as its destination for oil and natural gas. Oliver said China is Canada’s second-largest trading partner and Canadian exports to China have more than quadrupled since 2003. Last year, China National Offshore Oil Corp. acquired Canadian rival Nexen for $15.1 […]

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Greg Rickford, the man Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has selected to take over as Canada’s Resources Minister, immediately takes on one of the biggest challenges facing the Canadian economy: the stalled effort to get approval for Keystone XL. Under the Conservative government, the resources job has emerged as a high-profile role, responsible for the push to get landlocked Alberta crude to markets around the world. Pipeline construction has taken on heightened importance as Canada’s largest buyer of crude, the U.S., experiences an energy boom of its own toward a path of energy self-sufficiency. The job of Resources Minister became vacant after Joe Oliver was moved from that post to Finance, to fill the vacancy left by the resignation Tuesday of Jim Flaherty. Mr. Rickford was a junior minister in the cabinet, with responsibility for science policy and northern development in Canada’s largest province, Ontario. A key part of […]

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Canada is positioned to take advantage of growing energy demand and become a "21st century energy superpower," Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver said. The Canadian government estimates production from its vast oil deposits should reach 5 million barrels per day by 2035. Oliver told delegates at an energy conference in Ottawa, Ontario, those reserves could help meet the world’s growing appetite for oil. "We have solid economic fundamentals and unprecedented energy wealth," he said. "Canada is emerging as a 21st century energy superpower — unmatched in reliability, responsibility, and potential." The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries said in its monthly market report for March it revised its world oil demand growth for 2013 up by 70,000 barrels per day to 1.05 million barrels per day. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has sought to court Asian and European consumers in an effort to diversify an […]

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Canada is positioned to take advantage of growing energy demand and become a "21st century energy superpower," Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver said. The Canadian government estimates production from its vast oil deposits should reach 5 million barrels per day by 2035. Oliver told delegates at an energy conference in Ottawa, Ontario, those reserves could help meet the world’s growing appetite for oil. "We have solid economic fundamentals and unprecedented energy wealth," he said. "Canada is emerging as a 21st century energy superpower — unmatched in reliability, responsibility, and potential." The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries said in its monthly market report for March it revised its world oil demand growth for 2013 up by 70,000 barrels per day to 1.05 million barrels per day. Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has sought to court Asian and European consumers in an effort to diversify an […]

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Canada, despite tough operating conditions, expects future projects to target its northern arctic waters, the head of the National Energy Board said. NEB Chairman Gaetan Caron told delegates at an arctic energy conference in Calgary of the risks and prospects of operating in the frigid northern climate. Caron said more than 100 wells were drilled in the Canadian waters of the Beaufort Sea since 1973, though only one was completed in the last 20 years. "However, seismic exploration has continued and there is potential for further drilling activity," he said in his Tuesday remarks. U.S. drilling operations in arctic waters are generally on hold. Shell Chief Executive Officer Ben van Beurden said in January a series of mishaps in its drilling campaign off the Alaskan coast meant his company lacked a "clear path forward" in the arctic. For Canada, a joint venture between BP and Exxon Mobil has expressed […]

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  Nearly a year after unexplained leaks began to surface at one of For Canadian Natural Resources Ltd.’s main oil-sands production sites, the company remains haunted by the slow-motion spill. In the latest setback for the company, the Alberta Energy Regulator has turned down its application to resume steaming operations in affected area, known as Primrose, which sits on a military base in northern Alberta. “The AER determined that it was premature to approve this application, in lights of the ongoing investigation into the leaks at Primrose,” said Bob Curren, a spokesman for the province’s chief energy regulator. The AER’s decision came on Friday, just a day after CNRL chief executive Steve Laut told financial analysts the issue was “totally solvable” and that the Calgary-based company hoped to restart steaming in the impacted area “in the March-April time frame,” pending regulatory approval. The mysterious subterranean leaks of oily water, […]

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A decision by Canada’s National Energy Board to approve of a plan by Enbridge to reverse an oil pipeline will open up new markets, a trade group said. Canada’s National Energy Board, an independent federal regulator, gave Enbridge approval to reverse the 397-mile segment of its so-called Line 9 pipeline between Ontario and Quebec. The decision gives Enbridge consent to increase the pipeline’s overall capacity by 25 percent to 300,000 barrels per day. "Enbridge will be permitted to operate all of Line 9 in an eastward direction in order to transport crude oil from western Canada and the U.S. Bakken region to refineries in Ontario and Quebec," the NEB said in a statement Thursday. Greg Stringham, vice president of oil sands projects at the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, said the NEB’s decision adds diversity to the nation’s energy market. "The NEB’s decision is an important milestone that again […]

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Canadian regulators said the crude oil on a train that derailed in a Quebec town last July and killed 47 people was as volatile as gasoline, highlighting the potential danger of crude shipments by rail. The report by Canada’s Transportation Safety Board marked the first time that government officials have reported comprehensive test results from the train’s oil, which was traveling from North Dakota’s Bakken Shale formation to a refinery in New Brunswick. The safety board said the oil had a flash point, the temperature at which a fire can ignite, "similar to that of unleaded gasoline." The results confirmed a Wall Street Journal analysis published last month that showed Bakken oil contains more combustible gases than oil from elsewhere. The samples in the Quebec incident were taken from cars that didn’t explode at the accident site and another train carrying oil of the same origin. Canadian regulators previously […]

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