Alberta Truckers Support Oil Pipelines With Convoy   

Alberta truckers plan another event on Wednesday in support of the oil and gas industry in the province and in Canada, with hundreds expected to show up and take part in a convoy in Nisku, just south of Edmonton.

Truckers for Pipelines, the organizers of the event and the rally, have urged trucks “to come out to show support for the Canadian oil and gas industry and Canadian families from coast to coast.”

This is not the first event of truckers in support of the Alberta oil industry, which is going through a difficult time with huge discounts of Canadian oil prices because of insufficient capacity to take the oil out of the province.

Last weekend, hundreds rallied in the northern Albertan city of Grande Prairie to show support for the oil and gas industry, and to reaffirm that Alberta and Canada needs a pipeline. After the rally, hundreds of oil field trucks took over the streets of Grande Prairie, showing their support for the oil industry.

At the beginning of December, Alberta’s government enacted a mandatory short-term oil production cut in Canada’s oil patch effective January 1, in a bid to address the record-low Canadian heavy oil prices due to constrained takeaway capacity.

As of January 1, 2019, Alberta will be curtailing production by 325,000 bpd, or by 8.7 percent, to reduce market volatility and drive Canadian oil prices up, Alberta’s Premier Rachel Notley said in early December.  

The 325,000-bpd production cut is expected to take three months.

“After excess storage is drawn down, the reduction will drop to an estimated average of 95,000 barrels a day until Dec. 31, 2019 when the rules supporting this action end,” Notley said.

On Tuesday, reports emerged that Canada’s federal government will provide a US$1.2-billion (C$1.6-billion) lifeline to Alberta’s energy industry, with most of the funds to be used for “job support.”

The CTV News report comes on the heels of protests in Alberta against the lack of oil transport capacity that has seen the price of Canadian crude take a nosedive, hitting not just producers’ bottom lines but their workforce as well. 

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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