Monday, April 20, 2020

$0 Oil Has Come to Athabasca. Hey, How Are Those Pipelines Coming Along?



From Oilprice.com:

Canadian oil companies have begun shutting down steam-driven oil sands production projects as prices continue to fall, Reuters reports, noting the move could have dire long-term consequences for the production facilities. 
Steam-driven oil sands production, also called steam-assisted gravity drainage, involves injecting steam into an oil sands deposit to melt the bitumen and make it flow up the well. To ensure long-term production, the temperature and pressure at such sites must be maintained at a certain level. Disruption, Reuters explains, could result in permanent damage, which would translate into a permanent loss of production
Yet Western Canadian Select, the heavy oil benchmark of Canada, has been trading below $10 for about ten days now, with a temporary spike to $10.13 a barrel last Thursday. At the time of writing, WSC was trading at $-0.01 a barrel.
Oh, what's another $12-15 billion? It's money we don't have pissed away and that's all it is.

5 comments:

  1. Funny how nobody writes this up as a boon to Canadian consumers. Isn't that how offshoring our manufacturing was sold?

    The permanent loss of oil production in Alberta can join the permanent loss of cod fishing, asbestos mining and auto manufacturing in Oshawa, St. Thomas and Bromont. Suck it up, snowflakes! Talk to the invisible hand.

    Cap

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  2. It's something, isn't it Cap? Jason Kenney bet the farm on a huge rebound in oil prices later this year when he put Albertans' heads in the noose for billions to revive Keystone XL. Trudeau grossly overpaid the "sons of EnRon" for Trans Mountain and then underestimated the expansion costs by another four billion (for starters). It doesn't really matter. We still vote them back in.

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  3. .. actually.. Benchmark WTI - West Texas Intermediate went negative today
    Thus WCS dilbit - Western Canadian Select .. a major diluted Bitumen
    which tends to price approx 20% less than WTI went who knows where ?

    Remember too.. WTI at 56 or 58 $ or so
    is the price Mr Kenney built the Alberta Budget upon

    And again.. I must remind, even if MainMedia will not
    Mr Kenney obviously directed AIMCo
    to buy 65% controlliing interest from TC Energy..
    of the 6 Billion $ BC Coastal GasLink Pipeline

    Also 85% of Northern Courier pipeline from TC Energy
    which is/was to deliver dilbit from Fort Hills (Suncor)

    Then later put Alberta on the hook
    for almost 7 Billion re Keystone XL
    Again involving TC Energy.

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  4. It's a real shit show, Sal. WCS went at negative $0.01. On a break even basis that's something in the order of negative $50 per barrel. You can't pay for many pipelines with that math.

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  5. Alberta and KKKenney use different math and too make it even better,he is using the Pension plans of the Tarbertans to finance it.

    ReplyDelete