Oil sands
Oil sands, also called tar sands and bituminous sands are a combination of clay, water, bitumen and sand laid down in large deposits in over 70 countries in the world today. Bitumen is not tar or oil, although it has been mined and treated as road surfacing material in the past. Bitumen is a semisolid form of oil which is not liquefied enough to flow as does crude oil.
The oil sands deposits in Canada known as the Athabasca Oil Sands lie in the northern Alberta and Saskatchewan provinces are estimated to contain about 1.7 trillion barrels of oil which are now considered commercially extractible. The Venezuela Orinoco Oil Sands deposits contain an estimated 1.8 trillion barrels. At present, these two reserves of non-conventional oil reserves amassing a staggering 3.6 trillion barrels constitute a full 66% of the estimated world's oil reserves. The Middle Eastern countries which produce conventional oil (crude oil) have reserves reported at 1.75 trillion barrels at present.
Of the several bitumen deposits located in Canada, together totaling an area larger than the state of Florida, only one along the Athabasca River is concentrated enough to be commercially viable to mine the bitumen. One other, smaller deposit near Cold Lake, Alberta, contains bitumen in a form which is fluid enough to recover by conventional methods. Several companies planning over 100 operations are currently in various stages of development in the Canadian oil sands areas since, with the 2004-2006 rise in oil prices, it is now economically profitable to recover the product.
In Venezuela where they prefer to call the oil sands deposits by the name of extra heavy oil, the largest concentration of the world's reserves of extra-heavy oil (90%) is being developed for commercial production. Due to Venezuela's sometimes unstable political condition, capital has not been as readily available to develop the infrastructure of oil production as in Canada, even though the higher temperatures and higher quality oil sands make the Venezuelan product easier to produce.
In the United States, Utah's Tar Sand Resource covers eight smaller areas containing an estimated 32 billion barrels of oil has been quarried since the 1900's, primarily as road paving material. In the 1970's test sites were begun which died out when oil prices once again dropped in the 1980's.
At present, surface mining of the oil sands in the Athabasca Region is the preferred method. The bitumen lies about 40 to 60 meters deep under a layer of peat bog. The world's largest trucks (400 tons) and power shovels (100 tons) are used to remove the surface layer then carry the bitumen to a processing area where hot water and caustic soda are added to make slurry which can be sent through a pipeline to the extraction plant. The cost of production of the oil sands product is around $15 per barrel of synthetic crude oil, which still allows for a profitable production at today's oil prices.
The oil sands deposits in Canada known as the Athabasca Oil Sands lie in the northern Alberta and Saskatchewan provinces are estimated to contain about 1.7 trillion barrels of oil which are now considered commercially extractible. The Venezuela Orinoco Oil Sands deposits contain an estimated 1.8 trillion barrels. At present, these two reserves of non-conventional oil reserves amassing a staggering 3.6 trillion barrels constitute a full 66% of the estimated world's oil reserves. The Middle Eastern countries which produce conventional oil (crude oil) have reserves reported at 1.75 trillion barrels at present.
Of the several bitumen deposits located in Canada, together totaling an area larger than the state of Florida, only one along the Athabasca River is concentrated enough to be commercially viable to mine the bitumen. One other, smaller deposit near Cold Lake, Alberta, contains bitumen in a form which is fluid enough to recover by conventional methods. Several companies planning over 100 operations are currently in various stages of development in the Canadian oil sands areas since, with the 2004-2006 rise in oil prices, it is now economically profitable to recover the product.
In Venezuela where they prefer to call the oil sands deposits by the name of extra heavy oil, the largest concentration of the world's reserves of extra-heavy oil (90%) is being developed for commercial production. Due to Venezuela's sometimes unstable political condition, capital has not been as readily available to develop the infrastructure of oil production as in Canada, even though the higher temperatures and higher quality oil sands make the Venezuelan product easier to produce.
In the United States, Utah's Tar Sand Resource covers eight smaller areas containing an estimated 32 billion barrels of oil has been quarried since the 1900's, primarily as road paving material. In the 1970's test sites were begun which died out when oil prices once again dropped in the 1980's.
At present, surface mining of the oil sands in the Athabasca Region is the preferred method. The bitumen lies about 40 to 60 meters deep under a layer of peat bog. The world's largest trucks (400 tons) and power shovels (100 tons) are used to remove the surface layer then carry the bitumen to a processing area where hot water and caustic soda are added to make slurry which can be sent through a pipeline to the extraction plant. The cost of production of the oil sands product is around $15 per barrel of synthetic crude oil, which still allows for a profitable production at today's oil prices.
