Sands producers share green technologies

Twelve companies form science-based Canada’s Oil Sands Innovation Alliance to share knowledge, improve environmental performance

Gary Park

For Petroleum News

Struggling to persuade the world that their dirty oil image isn’t warranted, the leaders of 12 companies which account for 85 percent of production from Canada’s oil sands have agreed to start sharing their environmental knowhow, breaking down barriers that have slowed progress on that front.

After a year of backroom negotiations, the chief executives have agreed to form Canada’s Oil Sands Innovation Alliance, a science-based organization charged with becoming an “innovative hub … to accelerate the pace” of their environmental performance.

“We recognize that none of us has a monopoly on ideas or wisdom when it comes to the environment,” said Steve Williams, due to take over in May as chief executive officer of Suncor Energy.

He said the companies have come to realize that “we can improve environmental performance together better than we can as independent companies.”

“So we’re willing to waive some of our rights around intellectual property and proprietary technology,” Williams said. “There’s no pressure like peer pressure.

“Our 12 companies remain competitors and we’ll continue to compete aggressively in the market with our products. But we know that when it comes to the environment we’ll all win when we start working more closely together,” he said.

Murray Edwards, vice chairman of Canadian Natural Resources, told a news conference that COISA is “the right organization at the right time. For our industry to make strides in innovative environmental technologies, we will have to work together to achieve continuous improvement.”

The founding members are BP Canada, Canadian Natural Resources, Cenovus Energy, ConocoPhillips, Devon, Imperial Oil, Nexen, Shell Canada, Statoil, Suncor Energy, Total E&P Canada and Teck Resources. Those who have not signed up include Husky Energy, Athabasca Oil Sands Corp. and MEG Energy.

COISA’s immediate focus areas are land, water, greenhouse gases or GHG and toxic effluent from the mining of oil sands bitumen.

No targets set

He said the corporate leaders who signed the COISA charter are making a “very, very public commitment. The message they’re giving Canadians is that they’re taking the issue very seriously.”

Ed Whittingham, executive director of the Alberta-based energy and environmental think tank Pembina Institute, acknowledged the “magnitude” of the initiative, but said the “real work starts” when COISA sets targets and deadlines and produces results.

He said the promises made by the companies means “one operator’s liability is potentially the liability of every operator.”

Keith Stewart, a spokesman for Greenpeace, said the “absence of any commitments to real reductions in pollution” makes the effort “simply another example of ‘greenwash’.”

Separately, a paper released by the University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy has urged the Canadian government to scrap energy subsidies, streamline regulations and implement “full-cost pricing” on air contaminants, water use and GHG emissions.

Government would set price

Study author Nancy Olewiler, from Vancouver’s Simon Fraser University, said the challenge is daunting, but the sooner the government acts on either a direct tax on emissions, or introduces a cap-and-trade system, the better off Canada will be in the wise use of its natural resources.

A spokesman for Imperial Oil told the Globe and Mail that his company believes any climate policy should ensure the cost is applied evenly across the economy, maximize market mechanisms and minimize complexity and administrative costs.

He said a carbon tax is more aligned with “these key principles” than a cap-and-trade system or regulatory approaches.

Jack Mintz, who heads the school of public policy, said a carbon tax would allow the government to cut subsidies to all forms of energy and allow the market to function.