Petrobank and Penn West get gov't grants
Petrobank touts oilsands megaproject
Gordon Jaremko, edmontonjournal.com
Published: 5:04 pm
EDMONTON - A new entry is poised to enter the oilsands megaproject lineup despite provincial royalty hikes, following tests of technical advances aimed at cutting costs and pollution.
Petrobank Energy and Resources Ltd. vowed to make a start before the end of this year on obtaining regulatory approval for a 100,000-barrels-daily development. The project, run by subsidiary Whitesands Insitu Ltd., is partly fuelled by provincial aid.
After a year of putting new methods through field trials, the firm qualified today for the maximum $10 million available from Alberta Energy's "innovative energy technologies program." Instead of cash, the aid will be reduced royalties on initial production by a pilot plant on 160 square kilometres of oilsands leases near Conklin, a remote Metis community south of Fort McMurray.
Petrobank's Whitesands development is one of 18 projects receiving help from the three-year-old program, which is giving up to $200 million in royalty cuts for fresh approaches to tapping oil and natural gas. The aid plan expires in five years and the provincial government predicts the new production that it stimulates will eventually spin off enough new royalties to more than repay the initial reductions.
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Alberta Energy, meanwhile, also granted $6.5 million in innovation royalty reductions to Penn West Energy for a pilot project using carbon-dioxide injections to prolong production by the aging Swan Hills oilfield, 175 kilometres northwest of Edmonton. |
