Oil Sands Production

Baltimore, MD–Today, the most popular oil sands extraction method is dependent on natural gas. And considering that 80% of bitumen is located deep underground, the question is whether or not there is a future for oil sands once Canadian natural gas runs dry.

Over the last two weeks, a good number of you have been asking me about oil sands. And the majority of you were specifically asking about the various extraction methods.

Rather than look for secondhand information on the matter, I went right to the source. I spent the next few hours on the phone with a friend of mine. He has a front row seat to all the action. He’s lived and worked in Alberta’s oil sands for decades.

For the past few years, he’s seen the boom that Alberta has experienced from oil sands. With hundreds of billions of dollars pouring into projects, it’s no surprise that people are flocking there
After exchanging pleasantries and catching up, I wanted to get down to business. I asked him to give me a better idea of what’s going on up there.

“The problem is that the gas is going to run out,” he said. But we already knew that Canadian natural gas production peaked years ago.

Before I could mention that, he continued, “This is going to really complicate things when they’re going after the bitumen. Most of the oil companies out there are using huge amounts of natural gas during extraction.”

He was referring to the SAGD (Steam Assisted Gravity Drainage) process. Basically, a company uses natural gas-powered plants to generate steam to heat up the bitumen. The stem is injected into one horizontal well. Once melted, the bitumen flows into a lower horizontal well and pumped to the surface.

But like my friend just mentioned, there’s a massive amount of natural gas being used right now. It takes about one thousand cubic feet of natural gas to extract a barrel of oil. Naturally, the peaking of natural gas production will dramatically the cost to produce oil sands.

Since oil sands production are expected to triple within the next decade, this will mean a significant amount of trouble for producers…

Energy and Capital