Northern Canada gets upbeat rating from CEOs

Gary Park, Petroleum News Calgary correspondent

Canada’s best prospects of significant oil and natural gas discoveries lie north of the 60th parallel, say 44 chief executive officers who responded to Deloitte & Touche’s 11th annual Canadian industry outlook.

Bolstered by their view of commodity prices, 46 percent of the decision makers said Northern Canada was the best bet for significant gas finds and 33 percent put the region at the top of their list for oil discoveries, even though oil exploration has been shelved for more than two decades.

Trailing the north on the gas side were British Columbia 23 percent, Alberta 19 percent, East Coast 6 percent and a grab bag of other regions at 6 percent.

The East Coast claimed second spot on the oil list at 27 percent, trailed by Alberta 22 percent, Saskatchewan 7 percent and assorted others covering the remaining 11 percent.

Another three years of high oil and gas prices will give them the clout to step up exploration spending, the respondents said.

The overall view was “a lot more positive than we saw one years ago,” said Blair Kraus, a Deloitte partner and study co-author.

The CEOs said they expect gas prices to hover above C$6 per thousand cubic feet through 2005, compared with their forecast last year of average prices at C$4.63 this year and C$4.78 in 2004.

The survey forecast average crude oil prices of US$28.65 a barrel this year, easing to US $25.59 in 2005, compared with last year’s prediction of US$23.82 for 2003.

Given than optimism, almost half of the executives plan to increase exploration in Canada over the next three years and 91 percent believe that Canada has “significant” undiscovered gas reserves.