Page 14 - Sphere No.31 (Jul 2012)

12 Sphere 31
Ene rgy Husky’s
New Angle
As the world’s energy needs
continue to grow, more sophisticated,
environmentally friendly and efficient methods
of extracting the world’s remaining oil and
natural gas reserves will become increasingly
necessary. husky energy, one of Canada’s largest
integrated energy providers and an associated
hutchison whampoa company, continues to
seek out these new methods alongside efforts
to optimise existing technologies.
husky is at the forefront of the use of in
situ oil recovery methods in extracting some
of Canada’s most difficult to access reserves,
employing modern horizontal drilling
techniques. In the thick oil sands of the
western Canadian province of Alberta lies
one of the largest remaining concentrations
of petroleum resources in the world, estimated at
170 billion barrels of recoverable crude oil by the
Alberta energy resources Conservation Board.
This extra-heavy crude oil, called bitumen, is
more difficult to extract than traditional petroleum
because it is highly viscous and thus cannot be
extracted under normal reservoir temperatures.
The thick bitumen must be heated underground
before it can be pumped to the surface. only then
can it be refined into synthetic crude oil and other
petroleum products.
Multiple in situ methods can be employed to thin
the bitumen in order to ease the extraction process,
including the addition of solvents or the application
of heat through gas or steam. husky’s sunrise
energy Project in the Athabasca oil sands, located
60 kilometres northeast of Fort McMurray in eastern
Cutting-edge horizontal drilling techniques
optimise the life of Canada’s oil sands.