Suncor on Expansion Spree in Down Oilpatch

Canada's largest oil sands producer, Suncor, appeared to take a sharp turn on climate change when it announced to an annual meeting of its investors in Calgary on Thursday that it will dramatically boost oil production, despite facing the lowest oil prices in a generation.

Those historic lows have hollowed out Canada's oil-sands industry with layoffs and losses -- but sent Suncor on a buying spree.

Suncor sneaks tar sands tankers into St. Lawrence and Great Lakes

Suncor is setting a precedent around the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River Basin with its new shipments of bitumen on the St. Lawrence River.  On September 24, the first ever tanker to ship bitumen on the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River Basin left the port of Sorel-Tracey in Quebec. The tanker, the Minerva-Gloria, carried an estimated 700,000 barrels of bitumen to Sardinia, Italy which arrived on Tuesday at 4:22 p.m. local time. A second tanker, the Genmar Daphne, is expected to arrive in Sorel on Sunday, October 12 where it will be loaded, travel along the St. Lawrence River and transport another load of Alberta bitumen to Italy. There are plans to ship 20 to 30 vessels like this each year along the St. Lawrence River.

Warren Buffett Buys Stake In Calgary's Suncor

Warren Buffett has bought into the Alberta oilsands with a stake in Suncor Energy Inc., according to a Securities Exchange Commission filing released today.

Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Holdings owned 17.8 million Suncor shares on June 30, a stake valued at more than $500 million in the Calgary-based heavy-oil producer.

Suncor Energy cancels troubled Voyageur oilsands project

The company says market conditions have changed significantly, challenging the economics of the project.

The Voyageur upgrader was part of a joint venture Suncor inked with the Canadian arm of France’s Total just over two years ago.

Suncor says it has acquired Total E&P Canada Ltd.’s interest in the upgrader for $515 million to gain full control over the partnerships assets.

Suncor took a $1.49-billion writedown on Voyageur in the fourth quarter of 2012.

The company says it will take a charge to its first quarter net income and cash flow from operations of approximately $140 million and $180 million respectively as a result of the decision.

Original Article
Source: thestar.com
Author: CP

Suncor Oilsands Leak: Landowners, Environmentalists Demand To Know What Spilled

FORT MCMURRAY, Alta. - Oilsands giant Suncor says there was no bitumen in waste water that leaked from a burst pipe earlier this week.

An email from the company late Wednesday also says 350,000 litres of waste water leaked into the Athabasca River for about 10 hours.

Suncor Oilsands Pond Water Discharge Halted

FORT MCMURRAY, Alta. - Tests are being done to determine whether a waste water spill at an oilsands plant in northern Alberta made its way into a nearby river.

The leak was discovered Monday at a Suncor (TSX:SU) base plant north of Fort McMurray.

Suncor Voyager Oilsands Upgrader Takes $1.5 Billion Charge, Q4 Loss

CALGARY - Suncor Energy Inc. (TSX:SU) reported a fourth-quarter net loss as it took a big charge related to its long-shelved and economically "challenged" Voyageur oilsands upgrader.

Canada's biggest energy company said late Tuesday that the net loss for the last three months of 2012 was $562 million, or 37 cents per share, compared with net earnings of $1.43 billion, or 91 cents per share, during the same period a year earlier.

Suncor Drug Test: Alberta's Top Court Dismisses Bid To Randomly Screen Workers

EDMONTON - Alberta's top court has dismissed an appeal by Suncor Energy over its plan to randomly test thousands of its oilsands workers for drugs and alcohol.

Last October, the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers union won an injunction against the testing and a judge ordered the matter be settled by arbitration.

Suncor Gas Price Fixing Reaps $500K Fine

Suncor Energy Products Inc. has agreed to pay a $500,000 fine for price-fixing at some of the company's gas stations in Ontario.

The federal Competition Bureau said Friday that the Calgary-based energy giant has been fined for fixing the price of retail gasoline at service stations in Belleville, Ont., between May and November 2007.

"We are committed to pursuing those who engage in anti-competitive behaviour that harms Canadian businesses and consumers," Canada's competition commissioner, Melanie Aitken, said in a release.

The fine is related to an ongoing probe by the bureau into anti-competitive behaviour in the retail gasoline industry.

Earlier this month Canadian Tire, Pioneer and Mr. Gas stations in nearby Brockville and Kingston, Ont., pleaded guilty to anti-competitive behaviour surrounding gas prices. In that deal, the three companies agreed to pay fines totalling $2 million. The Competition Bureau said in the case that the "gas retailers or their representatives in these local markets phoned each other and agreed on the price they would charge customers for gasoline."

The federal agency's probe continues.

"Illegal agreements between competitors to fix prices deny consumers the benefits of competitive prices and choice," Aitken said.

Original Article
Source: Huff
Author: cbc

John Baird defends continuation of Suncor Energy activity in Syria

There's a good reason why Canadian oil-and-gas producer Suncor Energy Inc., is permitted to continue operating in Syria despite the abuses of its government against the population, Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird said Tuesday.

Speaking on a conference call held at the conclusion of a trip to the Middle East, Baird was asked why the same kind of sanctions that forced Calgary-based Suncor to shut down operations in Libya earlier this year, when the former regime of late dictator Moammar Gadhafi was attacking civilians, would not apply in Syria.

Baird said the main difference is that Suncor's operations in Libya were to produce oil for export, while in Syria, it is extracting natural gas to generate electricity domestically.

"Cutting off families from the electricity grid would have a significant detrimental consequence on popular support for reform, and at this time, we've decided it would be negative, not positive, to cut hospitals, places of work and families' homes off electricity," Baird said.

NDP grill Tories over Suncor’s operations in Syria

OTTAWA—New Democrats want to know why Ottawa’s sanctions against Syria allow Canadian energy giant Suncor to continue operating a $1.2 billion production facility in that country in partnership with a Syrian government-owned company.

Hélène Laverdière, the NDP foreign affairs critic, told the Commons Monday Canadian sanctions against Syria in October were supposed to send a strong message to President Bashar Assad’s regime but didn’t affect Suncor’s activities in that country.

“Will the government make sure that the new sanctions against Syria will stop their friends from doing business . . . while thousands of civilians are being killed,” she asked in question period.

Conservative MP Bob Dechert, parliamentary secretary to the minister of foreign affairs, said Canada “has taken decisive action by imposing sanctions that directly target members of the current Syrian regime and those who provide it with support.

“We are currently working with our allies to bring diplomatic pressure to bear,” Dechert added. “We will be bringing forth further stronger economic sanctions.”