Natural Resources committee  We have a proposed business model whereby we offer a service, and the service is free for the oil sands operator. They provide us their tailings, and we would be cleaning up their tailings, extracting bitumen that they would buy back and providing them with clean water that is warm because it's end-of-pipe.

Natural Resources committee  The incentives would be to attract investors in the public domain to relieve some of the risk exposure of implementing a new technology for the first unit. This could be easily achieved in using CRCE, which is the Canadian renewable and conservation expenses program, put in place in 1984, whereby we're able to go ahead and recover waste heat.

Natural Resources committee  The pilot plan cost is about $17,000 per flowing barrel per day in terms of capital expenditure, so you're looking for a 500-tonne unit, which is about $85 million. That is the total cost. The water is able to be recycled back within 15 minutes of operation, completely free of bitumen, and it's suitable for agriculture.

Natural Resources committee  I will be able to obtain that information from the review on water matters outside of Alberta that was submitted by the Pembina Institute. This was conducted in 2009. That is public information that is available.

Natural Resources committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair, Hon. Mr. McKay, and distinguished members of Parliament. I thank you for inviting me to make a presentation on Gradek Energy Inc.'s technology. Imagine if we had the technology to clean up tailings ponds. Imagine if Canada could extract oil sands without creating a tailings pond.

Environment committee  Some of the heavy metals that you mentioned stay in the primary tails. They don't get drawn with the bitumen froth, because they're not oliophilic. So they remain there and the concentration is not increased whatsoever. They go back into the sand volume.

Environment committee  The dike embankment construction, and so on.

Environment committee  The carbon footprint? The carbon intensity of a barrel of bitumen that will be extracted and generated from this process on a commercial scale is anticipated to be minus 828 megajoules per barrel, which is a net negative carbon intensity. It's the greenest fuel on this planet.

Environment committee  Titanium dioxide, aluminum dioxide, and zirconium dioxide. From the study undertaken by the Alberta government, those are co-products that exist in the oil sands deposits, and they get concentrated up into the fine tailings streams. They are oliophilic, so they adhere to the bitumen coating on the bead.

Environment committee  We don't have that money yet.

Environment committee  That question is a broad question. I mean, to accomplish what?

Environment committee  At this stage, the pilot project for both phases amounts to about $50 million.

Environment committee  With the present inventory of tailings ponds, they won't need water, no freshwater uptake.

Environment committee  I think mining operations are limited by the economics of overburden removal. Therefore, that's the word, “limitations”. If I remember correctly, the estimates were to ramp up mining operations to a production level of 2,125,000 barrels per day by the year 2025. This was the AERCB or EUB's estimate in 2007.

Environment committee  Definitely. It all depends on the viscosity of the oil. As you raise the temperature, viscosity decreases. For every 10 degrees, it's one order of magnitude. For instance, weathered crude is 10,000 centipoise at 20° Celsius. Bitumen is 1 million centipoise at 20° Celsius. In order to reach the same viscosity, you have to raise the temperature of the bitumen to 40° Celsius to be equivalent to that of weathered crude at 20°.