While debate remains over future demand for Alberta’s heavy crude, business leaders say Tuesday’s approval of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion is a positive economic step, sending a welcome sign to global investors and easing export constraints to support higher prices. The twinning of the pipeline from Alberta to B.C. He said demand exists for the additional supply across a range of countries, with that demand fuelled in part by petrochemical growth. “Trans Mountain will help, but there will need to be a few other moves as well.” Trans Mountain currently represents the sole made-in-Canada option — there are two other pipelines working their way through the U.S. regulatory process — to an industry that has been hamstrung by a lack of shipping capacity weighing on local heavy crude prices and preventing production increases. Anderson argues that Alberta’s bitumen has not found a significant offshore market and Venezuela and Mexico have faced the same low demand and low prices.

Source: thestar June 18, 2019 21:56 UTC