July 2, 2008

Alberta Oilsands

Canada’s first oilsands upgrader producing once again

Richard Gilbert

staff writer

Production at Canada’s first commercial oilsands upgrader began again after a planned maintenance shutdown lasted longer than the predicted 30-day period.

Suncor Energy Inc. announced on June 24 that production at its oilsands operation is expected to ramp up over the next several days, as the planned maintenance shutdown of one of its two oilsands upgraders is complete.

“We have two upgraders at our oilsands plants. They are taken down periodically for general maintenance to improve reliability,” said Suncor spokesman Brad Bellows.

Upgrader 1 was supposed to be down for just 30 days of maintenance.

The shutdown began May 18, but unplanned work, combined with labour shortages, resulted in the maintenance lasting longer than expected.

The main contractor for the maintenance work is Transfield Services, which hired about 2,000 contractors to do the work.

Planned shutdowns, which are part of the normal course of operations at the company’s oil sands facilities, are scheduled to provide both preventative maintenance and capital replacement to improve operational efficiency.

“(The upgrader maintenance) construction runs the whole gamut of skilled trades, such as welder and pipefitters,” Bellows explained.

The oilsands facility has been operating at about 200,000 barrels a day during the work on the upgrading unit.

Suncor expects average oilsands production targets of 275,000 to 285,000 bpd in 2008.

Scheduled maintenance on the upgrader is undertaken every three years.

Suncor is Canada’s original oilsands developer, having produced the first barrel of crude oil from the Athabasca oilsands at their operations facility near Fort McMurray, Alberta in 1967.

Today, Upgrader 1 continues to recover bitumen from oilsands and upgrade it to refinery-ready feedstock and diesel fuel.

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