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27-566: The WCSB is considered a mature area for exploration of petroleum and recent development has tended toward natural gas and oil sands rather than conventional oil. In the WCSB, conventional oil is of two different types: light crude oil and heavy crude oil , each with different costs, prices, and development strategies. Conventional light oil is a mature industry with most of the recoverable oil reserves already produced and production declining by three to four percent per year. Conventional heavy oil

54-662: A 2010 paper. The majority of the large gas pools have been discovered and a significant portion of the discovered reserves has been produced. Production from the basin peaked in 2001 at around 16 billion cubic feet (450,000,000 m) per day and was predicted in 2003, by the National Energy Board to be likely to decline from that level. The overall decline rate increased from 13 percent per year in 1992 to 23 percent in 2002, which means 3.8 billion cubic feet per day (110,000,000 m/d) of production must be replaced each year just to keep production constant. With

81-866: A blowout such as the one that happened with BP in the Gulf of Mexico. But the NEB has said that other equally effective methods would be considered. Economist Robyn Allan, questioned the July 28, 2015 appointment by the Governor in Council on behalf of the Office of the Prime Minister, of Steven J. Kelly — a former Kinder Morgan consultant — as a full-time member of the National Energy Board (Board). In

108-475: A conflict of interest with Kelly's appointment which is effective October 13. Alternative dates have not yet been provided. Kinder Morgan has already filed copious amounts of IHS evidence with affidavits that was submitted by Steven Kelly in support of Kinder Morgan's application for the proposed pipeline expansion Trans Mountain. According to the NEB, all Kelly's evidence will be struck from the record. The NEB process has been sharply criticized and even called

135-567: A letter dated August 21, 2015 NEB Board of Directors chair David Hamilton and fellow Members, Alison Scott and Philip Davies wrote a In 1996 Kelly joined Purvin & Gertz, Inc. now IHS Inc. and was vice-president of IHS Global Canada, "an oil industry consulting firm hired by Kinder Morgan to do an economic study justifying the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion." NEB postponed oral hearings scheduled for August 24 in Calgary to avoid

162-503: A total of 180 aboriginal / indigenous groups). Opposition to Northern Gateway and Energy East is strong among natives. A veto is supported by some Canadian oil extraction corporations such as Suncor and Tembec . Indigenous groups have a long history of winning court challenges in Canada. While the NEB does hear aboriginal oral evidence from 70 specific intervenors the NEB process created under Stephen Harper falls far short of

189-499: Is also past its production peak with a future of long-term decline . Alberta, which contains most of the reserves, expects its light-medium crude oil production to decline by 42% from 2006 to 2016, while it expects heavy crude production to decrease by 35% over the same period. However, it also expects bitumen and synthetic crude oil from oil sands will considerably more than offset the decline in conventional crude oil and account for 87% of Alberta oil production by 2016. For light oil,

216-481: Is consumed in Canada, and most is exported to Japan, Korea and other countries. The lower rank coals are used mainly for electricity generation, where the existence of shallow coal seams with little overburden make strip-mining and reclamation easy, and low sulfur levels reduce the environmental impact of their use. 55°N 112°W  /  55°N 112°W  / 55; -112 Conventional oil Too Many Requests If you report this error to

243-660: Is exploring new zones in undrilled portions of the basin to find remaining undiscovered pools, or to apply EOR schemes such as water floods, thermal projects, and miscible floods such as the Vapour Extraction Process (VAPEX) technology. Only 15 percent of heavy oil is currently being recovered, leaving a large volume for future recovery. Improved seismic and drilling technology, higher recoveries from existing pools through infill drilling, and efficient, cost-effective exploration and development of smaller pools are maintaining levels of conventional oil production in

270-839: Is the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples . Under the UNDRIP, indigenous peoples on unceded lands, including those over which Northern Gateway and Energy East would need to pass, appear to most authorities to have a strict veto and not mere "consultation" rights as under Canada's 1981 constitution. That constitution was not agreed to by the province of Quebec nor aboriginal authority at any level. This especially affects Energy East , as New Brunswick and Quebec Maliseet accordingly have strict authority under UNDRIP to unilaterally reject it, as its proposed route crosses their territory (and those of

297-666: The Cold Lake Oil Sands and the Peace River Oil Sands, which contain initial oil-in-place reserves of 260 billion cubic metres (1.6 trillion barrels ), an amount comparable to the total world reserves of conventional oil. The World Energy Council reported (2007) that the three Alberta oil sands areas contain at least two-thirds of the world's discovered bitumen in place. These three major oil sands areas, all in Alberta, have reserves that dwarf those of

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324-404: The petroleum industry is searching for the remaining undiscovered pools, drilling infill oil wells , or redeveloping existing pools using enhanced oil recovery (EOR) techniques such as waterfloods , miscible floods, and carbon dioxide injection. Currently, only about 27 percent of light oil is recovered, leaving large opportunities for improvement. For conventional heavy oil, the industry

351-650: The CBM wells were completed in the Upper Cretaceous Horseshoe Canyon and Belly River formations, at typical depths of 300 to 2,400 feet (91–732 m). About 4 percent of the CBM wells are completed in the Lower Cretaceous Mannville Formation , at depths of 2,300 to 4,300 feet (700–1,310 m). Author David J. Hughes in his 2004 book entitled North America's Natural Gas Crisis , predicted that

378-764: The EPA and Obama administration on Keystone XL . Both dropped these climate change concerns in December 2014 despite the Pembina Institute estimate that "Energy East would cause 32 million tonnes of added greenhouse-gas emissions every year, which would cancel out the emissions reductions Ontario achieved by closing all of its coal-fired power plants". Another complicating factor is the position of Brad Wall , Premier of Saskatchewan, that equalization can be withheld from provinces that do not support raw bitumen export. A final issue requiring federal clarification

405-551: The Harper-era process of regulation, and especially the NEB, citing serious conflict of interest and mandate flaws. As of December 2016, no changes to the Board had been announced. The NEB's lack of coherence on climate change is a major source of uncertainty. Ontario and Quebec had initially imposed approval conditions on Energy East re "upstream" emissions in Alberta, similar to those imposed both upstream and downstream by

432-684: The Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin would likely continue to be the main gas supply area in Canada for many years; however, declining production and the likelihood that much of the gas will be diverted to fuel new oil sands plants mean that the probability of there being sufficient surplus gas to meet projected U.S. demand is low, and the US will have to look elsewhere for future gas supplies. The WCSB contains about 90 percent of Canada's usable coal resources. Their rank ranges from lignite to semianthracite . About 36 percent of

459-830: The Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin. As the basin matures, the resource triangle with few large pools at the top, and many small pools at the base is being economically pursued deeper into the smaller pool segment as a result of these efficiencies. According to the Alberta Energy and Utilities Board (EUB, now known as the Alberta Energy Regulator, the AER), Alberta's oil sands areas contain an ultimately recoverable crude bitumen resource of 50 billion cubic metres (315 billion barrels), with remaining established reserves of almost 28 billion cubic metres (174 billion barrels) at year-end 2004. The Athabasca Oil Sands ,

486-597: The Wikimedia System Administrators, please include the details below. Request from 172.68.168.133 via cp1102 cp1102, Varnish XID 542470575 Upstream caches: cp1102 int Error: 429, Too Many Requests at Thu, 28 Nov 2024 05:41:04 GMT National Energy Board The National Energy Board was an independent economic regulatory agency created in 1959 by the Government of Canada to oversee "international and inter-provincial aspects of

513-428: The basin being largely explored and operators finding less gas with each new well, this seems improbable. New gas reserves in the WCSB will likely come from unconventional sources such as coalbed methane (CBM). The number of coalbed methane wells in Alberta more than doubled in 2005, to 7764 by the end of that year, producing nearly 0.5 billion cubic feet (14,000,000 m) of gas per day. More than 95 percent of

540-456: The construction and operation of international power lines , defined as lines built "for the purpose of transmitting electricity from or to a place in Canada from or to a place outside of Canada." The NEB authorized imports of natural gas, and exports of crude oil, natural gas, oil, natural gas liquids (NGLs), refined petroleum products and electricity. The NEB also had jurisdiction over designated inter-provincial power lines, by determination of

567-476: The conventional oil fields. By 2007 the Alberta natural bitumen deposits were the source of over one third of the crude oil produced in Canada. As a result of the oil price increases since 2003 , the number of major mining , upgrading and thermal in-situ projects has grown to some 46 existing and proposed projects, encompassing 135 project expansion phases in various stages of execution. Estimates of capital expenditures to construct all announced projects over

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594-615: The demands of aboriginal groups themselves. In 2014 John Bennett, national program director for the Sierra Club Canada (SCC) criticized the NEB for considering changes in its approach to preventing oil spills in future offshore drilling in the Beaufort Sea . Current policy requires companies working in the Arctic to have the capability to drill a relief well in the same season to release pressure and stop oil flow in case of

621-591: The federal Cabinet, but no such line has been designated, leaving the regulation of existing interties to provincial regulatory bodies. Recent NEB decisions in favour of petroleum-industry interests have led to increasing controversy. On 28 August 2019, the NEB Act was repealed by the coming into force of the Canada Energy Regulator Act (CER Act). Prime Minister Justin Trudeau condemned

648-633: The oil, gas and electric utility industries." Its head office was located in Calgary , Alberta . The NEB mainly regulated the construction and operation of oil and natural gas pipelines crossing provincial or international borders. The Board approved pipeline traffic, tolls and tariffs under the authority of the National Energy Board Act . It dealt with approximately 750 applications annually, through written or oral proceedings. The National Energy Board also had jurisdiction over

675-462: The period 2006 to 2015 total $ 125 billion. According to a Statistics Canada 2006 report, this extremely high level of activity has caused a severe labor shortage in Alberta and driven unemployment rates to their lowest level in history – the lowest of all 10 Canadian provinces and 50 U.S. states. This is the main factor limiting growth of oil sands production in the WCSB. Canada is the third largest producer and second largest exporter of gas in

702-465: The total estimated 71,000 megatonnes of usable coal is bituminous , including a high proportion of medium to low volatile coals. The low sulfur content and acceptable ash levels of these bituminous coals make them attractive as coking feedstocks, and large quantities are mined for that purpose. However, the lack of heavy industry in Western Canada means that only a limited amount of this coal

729-513: The world, with the vast majority of it coming from the WCSB. The WCSB is estimated to have 143 trillion cubic feet (4,000 km) of marketable gas remaining (discovered and undiscovered), which represents about two thirds of Canadian gas reserves. Over half of the gas produced is exported to the United States. However, Canadian gas reserves represent less than one percent of world reserves and are rapidly becoming exhausted according to

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