Canada NEWS

Calgary-based Canadian Natural Resources Ltd completed the acquisition of Laricina Energy Ltd., confirming acceptance from holders of 98.7% Laricina’s issued and outstanding shares. CNRL will pay C$46.35 million for the shares by Sept. 18. Laricina holds two steam-run gravity drainage projects in the West Athabasca region of Alberta, Germain and Saleski. Both the projects put off operations right in the early development stages in 2015.

At an enterprise valuation of $2 billion, investment firm Brookfield is all set to acquire the East West Pipeline Ltd (EWPL), currently running at a loss. Post-acquisition, Brookfield will own the 1,400 km common carrier pipeline from Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh to Bharuch in Gujarat. Brookfield is supporting India Infrastructure Trust, an infrastructure investment trust (InvIT) as the acquisition vehicle.

British E&P major, EnQuest Plc concluded first ship-to-ship transfer at the Shetland’s Sullom Voe terminal. EnQuest transferred 500,000 barrels of crude oil with the help of the Canadian-registered shuttle tanker, The Heather Knutsen. Environmental groups in other parts of Scotland have been against the practice of ship-to-ship transfers over crude oil over potential oil spill in the sea.

Kick starting an investment driven oil-sands project, Fort Hills, Suncor Energy’s oil-sands mine had its formal opening on Monday. Clearing dense forest and dumping oily soils in giant trucks and processing it into heavy crude for U.S. refineries has made industry people hopeful. According to analysts, an era of big projects in the freezing wilderness of Canada will see a new dawn through minimized carbon emissions, combined with lower costs.

Canadian synthetic crude prices dropped on Thursday to the biggest discount to WTI futures since December 2013. An announcement from Suncor Energy about concluding repairs on the Syncrude Canada upgrader, which was shut after a power disruption in June, sent oil prices downhill. The production surge in Suncor’s new Fort Hills oil sands mine also contributed to the fall.

CEO of Suncor Energy Inc. has denied any further pipeline expansions in Canada “until it becomes clearer when new pipelines will be ready”. Suncor took this decision after the Canadian court upended the government’s consent of expansion of Trans Mountain pipeline. In Canada, the new pipelines construction has failed to match the rate of heavy oil production which is now disrupting the supply and creating pricing issues for the country.

The oil major of France, Total, along with its partners, has decided to sell its Alberta’s Joslyn oil sands project. The oil sands project will be sold to Canadian Natural Resources Limited (CNRL) in Canadian $225 million. Total had 38.25% stake in Joslyn project. CEO of Total said that this move will lower their exposure to Canada’s oil sands but their strategy now is to focus on low breakeven resources.

Alberta will be implementing a new automated system, known as Integrated Decision Approach (IDA) which will be fully operational by 2021. It will help the companies to submit only one application to cover the life of a project while earlier, separate applications were used for different project activities. It is operated by Alberta Energy Regulator and the companies of Alberta have saved $107 million so far, informed the government.

High Arctic Energy Services has entered into a contract renewal contract with Oil Search Limited. All primary contracts of the Calgary-based energy services firm in Papua New Guinea will be renewed for a three-year term. The PNG-LNG facility returned to full production after shut down post a significant earthquake in February.

In a press conference yesterday, the US Chemical Safety Board portrayed faulty valve in the FCCU as the cause of the blast in Husky Energy refinery in Wisconsin. The board explained that the Iron Sulfide in the carbon steel of the fluidic catalytic cracking unit (FCCU) was possibly ignited by the air leaking in the unit. The explosion led to a discharge of flaming asphalt across the refinery.

Canada-based Enbridge divested its US-based assets of midstream and monetized some of its renewables business of approximately $2.4bn. The sale is part of Enbridge’s move to reduce debt. 11,900 miles of gas and NGL pipelines, 25 processing plants, 12 treating plants, an E/P fractionator and various liquid logistics are included in the assets sold. The firm has also sold its 49% stake in North American onshore renewable power assets.

Canadian oil and gas producer, Encana Corp.has reported a net loss of $151 million in its second-quarter earnings report. Compared to the last year’s profit, the company went in loss by a $326 million non-cash charge in this quarter. Encana’s production of oil and gas climbed up to 337,900 barrels of oil equivalent per day.

Canada-based Husky Energy has granted a one-year contract extension to Transocean’s Henry Goodrich drilling rig. The semi-submersible rig is currently deployed in the Atlantic Ocean offshore Canada. The assessed contract backlog is approximately $100 million, implying that the dayrate is around $274.000. The extended will keep the rig busy until late 2019.

The Syncrude outage last month had investors worrying, but the latest report on second-quarter profits of Suncor Energy have dispelled all the concerns. Despite the Syncrude facility shutoff, Suncor managed to generate $1.87 billion in cash from operations in the last quarter, a rise of 46% from 2Q2017. The Calgary-based oil sands firm has projected 740,000 to 750,000 boed in output this year.

Norwegian oil giant, Equinor has entered into an agreement with Canadian provinces for $5.2b to carry out a deepwater oil project offshore Canada’s east coast. The provinces of Newfoundland and Labrador are acquiring a 10% equity stake in the Bay du Nord project, expected to possess over 300 million barrels of high-quality crude oil. The project is estimated to generate $10.7b in economic activity and $2.7b in government revenues.

Canadian pipeline major, Kinder Morgan yesterday released its quarterly report, with a quarterly profit that nearly halved from the last time. The lower profit was owed to the firm moving lower volumes of crude oil through its pipeline, and obviously, due to the pending sale of Trans Mountain pipeline with the Canadian government. Net income dropped to C$13.7 million, from C$25.1 million, a year earlier.

Black Diamond Group has secured a $42.5 million camp contract for the Coastal Gas Link pipeline project, which is reportedly 670 km in length. Partnering with West Moberly First Nations, this construction project will have a service period of 27 months. The pipeline will deliver natural gas to a facility near Kitimat, where LNG Canada will carry out the liquefaction for further export.

Canada’s largest drilling contractor, Precision Drilling Corp. has bagged a 5-year take-or-pay contract of newbuild ST-3000 drilling rig in Kuwait whose capital cost is estimated to be around $60 million. Through free cash flow generation, Precision is looking to reduce its debt in 2018. Demands for Precision’s rigs have risen considerably in the U.S.