There are still plenty of opportunities to export Alberta’s bitumen, said economist Todd Hirsch at Thursday’s Chamber of Commerce luncheon, even with the province’s looming financial crisis.
“Let’s worry a little bit, but let’s not worry too much,” said Hirsch, senior economist at ATB Financial.
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In front of a government panel on Tuesday, a labour group argued in favour of increasing refining operations in Alberta, instead of sending unprocessed bitumen to foreign refineries.
Alberta Federation of Labour president Gil McGowan told the province’s Standing Committee on Alberta’s Economic Future that upgrading bitumen locally should be a top priority for resource development and job growth.
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EDMONTON – A labour group on Tuesday urged a government committee to support construction of new upgraders to stop oil conglomerates who want to “rip and ship” Alberta’s resources.
The Standing Committee on Alberta’s Economic Future also heard from an industry group that said market forces alone should decide whether a new upgrader is necessary, and from a project proponent who would benefit from provincial support.
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Strathcona County watched in dismay as the plans for half-a- dozen upgraders disappeared with the 2008-09 global meltdown, recalls Mayor Linda Osinchuk.
But these days, there’s some optimism that at least two of the projects are possible — reviving the mothballed Heartland, also called the B.A. upgrader, already partially built by Calgary-based Value Creation Inc.; and the North West upgrader near Redwater that will turn bitumen into diesel.
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The American Petroleum Institute’s recent claim that the United States has “become a global superpower on energy” may have given many in Canada cause for even more concern than they have already experienced lately.
The API can be forgiven for its chest-beating as its boast is backed by declining U.S. energy imports and the oil and gas gushing out of a number of light-shale plays dotted across the country.
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Alberta’s Industrial Heartland Association (AIHA) chairperson and Strathcona County Mayor Linda Osinchuk opened her update at the group’s stakeholder event last Thursday by saying “We are the solution — the Alberta Industrial Heartland.”
While that phrase can take on many meanings, it is clear that her boasting the Heartland as a “solution” counters Premier Alison Redford’s claim of the energy industry being the problem.
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EDMONTON – Premier Alison Redford has urged Ontario leaders to work with Alberta to diversify markets for Alberta oil to pop the so-called “bitumen bubble” preventing oilsands producers from getting full price for their products.
In a speech Wednesday to the Canadian Club at Toronto’s Fairmont Royal York Hotel, Redford said Canada will lose $27 billion in revenue as a result of the discount on Alberta oil, and highlighted the $63 billion in goods and services that flow into Ontario from Alberta’s oilsands sector.
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CALGARY — When Energy Minister Ken Hughes talks about the oilsands Thursday in Vancouver, he’ll have a message for our coastal cousins: “Not all roads lead through British Columbia.”
Translation: If B.C. won’t transport bitumen, Alberta will find somebody who’s glad to do it.
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As Premier Alison Redford took to the air to lament the widening price differential between Alberta bitumen and world crude, Cal Dallas took a Euro-coaster of a trip to do something about it.
Dallas, Minister of International and Intergovernmental Relations, met with dozens of officials from business and government in five European capitals, pitching Alberta bitumen with a worrisome Fuel Quality Directive (FQD) vote looming. His quest: a fair shake for Alberta bitumen with the province’s third largest trading partner and the nation’s second largest source of foreign investment.
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EDMONTON — A dramatic drop in the price Alberta oilsands companies receive for their product will strip about $6 billion in resource royalties from the coming 2013-14 budget, Premier Alison Redford revealed Thursday in a televised state of the province address.
“This bitumen bubble means the Alberta government will collect about $6 billion less in revenue this year alone,” Redford said in a taped eight-minute video clip shot in her Calgary home last Friday. “To put that into context, that’s the equivalent to all our government’s spending on education each year. So as we prepare for this year’s budget, it means we have to make some very difficult choices.”
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