The Canadian Press reports, “Cenovus Energy is keen on a TransCanada proposal to ship crude eastward, especially if the pipeline stretches all the way to the Atlantic Ocean, the CEO of the Calgary-based oil company said Thursday. …The TransCanada pipeline could ship between 500,000 and one million barrels of crude per day. Cenovus is less interested in feeding the Irving Oil refinery in Saint John than it is accessing tidewater, so that crude can be sent by tankers to lucrative markets around the world. Currently, the crude Cenovus and its peers produce is landlocked.”
“‘The capacity of the pipeline is far in excess of the Irving refinery size so the key is to get to a deep water port and be able to put production onto tankers and acess international markets,’ said Brian Ferguson, (the CEO of Cenovus). ‘There would certainly be volumes that would go to the Irving refinery, but it would be an export point.’ Ferguson said Cenovus foresees being able to move both its oilsands and light crude east. ‘The plan is to be able to access tidewater and tankers and move volumes either down to the U.S. Gulf Coast or to Asia or to Europe from Saint John.'”
“TransCanada says it’s economically and technically feasible to convert a portion of its part-empty natural gas mainline to oil service. That line stops at the Quebec-Vermont border, so new pipe would have to be built to connect to Saint John, home to Canada’s largest oil refinery and a large deep-water port. TransCanada aims to formally gauge shipper interest in an open season later this year. It would be several years before western crude would make its way to the east, as the proposal has not yet been submitted to the National Energy Board.”
Currently, “About 11,500 Cenovus barrels flow along the existing 300,000 Trans Mountain pipeline to the B.C. Lower Mainland and Washington State. A small fraction of that goes to Asia. Another 20,000 travel to the Gulf Coast through ExxonMobil’s Pegasus pipeline. Some 6,000 barrels a day move by rail, and Cenovus sees that growing to 10,000 this year. Small volumes are also moving by barge through third-party agreements. Between Northern Gateway and the Trans Mountain expansion, Cenovus has committed to ship 175,000 barrels of oil per day to the West Coast. It has signed up to ship another 150,000 barrels per day to the Gulf between Keystone XL and Enbridge Gulf Coast access projects.”
For more please see:
– NEWS: Harper government backs west-to-east pipeline proposals, http://canadians.org/blog/?p=19132
– NEWS: New Brunswick premier to visit Alberta to back west-to-east pipeline with export options, http://canadians.org/blog/?p=19038
– NEWS: TransCanada East Coast pipeline eyes tar sands exports to China, India and Europe, http://canadians.org/blog/?p=17070
