Sector News

Oil sands are still attractive – ConocoPhillips

November 18, 2015
News

ConocoPhillips Canada has poured cold water on suggestions that oil sands assets are being viewed as the least attractive assets as a result of low oil prices.

Speaking to the Oil & Gas Council, ConocoPhillips Canada’s Dominic Macklon revealed that production was actually set to ‘ramp up’ at the company’s Foster Creek and Christina Lake developments, jointly owned with Cenovous.

‘We’re also on track at Surmont 2, the largest single phase SAGD project ever built. All three of these fields are in the top tier of the Canadian oil sands in terms of reservoir quality, which helps tremendously towards global competitiveness. Over the next three years, those projects will be less capital intensive, which leaves us well placed to deliver the margin growth we are looking for.’

Macklon said in order for oil sands to be economically successful within the current climate, it was essential that companies showed an ability to safely and sustainably lower the cost of supply.

‘This is a challenge we share as an industry, a province and a nation, and by working together with the provincial and federal government and our many stakeholders, I believe we will be successful.’

Macklon also pointed to ConocoPhillips’ reputation for innovation as being significant.

‘Innovation is one of our core values ? we have some incredible minds looking at ways to do things differently. Of all of the opportunities, I think I am most interested in those looking to recover the product while using less steam, and hence less natural gas and water. We are already first-tier in our steam-to-oil ratio, but technologies that look to bring those numbers down even more are of great interest to me.’

However Macklon was also under no illusions that there was still much to do.

‘The challenge we face is the same as that as anyone in the industry ? managing a volatile price environment while delivering our product safely and responsibly with minimal impact to the environment. We take this challenge very seriously,’ he said.

‘For some context, in the first quarter we delivered volumes of 1.6 million BOE per day (1,610 MBOED). Our focus this year is on looking for ways to do things differently to sustainably bring down the cost of supply. It’s a matter of setting, and controlling, our own destiny as we move through this industry’s dynamic time and to set ourselves up for future growth and success.

By John Harvey, Marketer for Oil & Gas Council

Source: Oil Voice

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