Evidence of meeting #20 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 40th Parliament, 2nd session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was technologies.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
The last question I have is based on the process that you've shown us. The naphtha is basically the catalyst that breaks the bond. That's your diluent, or solvent.
President, Gradek Energy Inc.
It doesn't break the bond, it displaces it. It dissolves the bitumen, which is a high-viscosity component, and it displaces, or replaces, and spreads over the surface area of the bead.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
Would you upgrade the naphtha off the oil before you send it up to the plant, so you could reuse the naphtha in your enclosed facility? Or would it go up there and ship back as a diluent later on?
President, Gradek Energy Inc.
It would be the second choice. It would be used for pipelining. We have to have the same spec in delivering a product to the oil company as their pipeline, in order to introduce it into their pipeline going to the upgrader. If it's 50% diluent and 50% bitumen, I have to meet that spec.
Conservative
President, Gradek Energy Inc.
Forever. No leaching. It can freeze. Put it in the freezer on ice and six months later thaw it out. You've still got your oil.
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
I think your time is up.
Are there any more questions?
Yes, Mr. Watson, go ahead.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Blaine was having too much fun here. I almost feel like I shouldn't be taking his time. If I have anything left over, I'll cede it to you. How about that?
I want to start with Mr. Hamza. I just have a quick question about your slide deck here. You talk about the economic impact of the oil sands, 120,000 direct and indirect jobs. Forty-one per cent of the jobs are outside Alberta. What is the jobs impact or the investment impact, if you will, for the province of Ontario?
Director General, Department of Natural Resources, CANMET Energy Technology Centre (CETC) - Devon
Actually, I don't have the numbers with me, but it is in manufacturing and in secondary-type industries. It's in equipment, monitors, and this high-tech type of activity. The numbers are available, and actually CERI published a report maybe three years ago that has all of the numbers broken down, from Statistics Canada and so on, across the whole country.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
I'm told it's in the neighbourhood of $500 million for the province of Ontario in terms of activity.
I want to move on to Mr. Gradek. I have a couple of questions here.
You've said that at the end of your process the water can be reintroduced to extraction activities on the front end. What kind of impact is that going to have in terms of freshwater withdrawals, in terms of new water into the--
President, Gradek Energy Inc.
With the present inventory of tailings ponds, they won't need water, no freshwater uptake.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
Okay.
If we're eliminating the ultimate use of existing tailings ponds and, as you're suggesting, freshwater draws, will this encourage new mining operations as opposed to a shift to in situ?
President, Gradek Energy Inc.
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.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
Mr. Hamza, you may have suggested that one of the reasons industry hasn't taken this particular technology up on a large scale is that there may be competing technologies that address the water issue on the back end. Is it fair to say that industry is maybe looking beyond that, to how to lower water use on the front end?
You may want to comment on that as well, Mr. Gradek.
Director General, Department of Natural Resources, CANMET Energy Technology Centre (CETC) - Devon
Actually, I have a correction. I tried to get away from--
Director General, Department of Natural Resources, CANMET Energy Technology Centre (CETC) - Devon
--intimating anything. I said that there are other technologies. There are many of them, and the industry is looking at all of them and they will select the one that would be in their best interest. This is the case with the industry all the time.
There are a lot of technologies around. There's technology that the industry participated in developing themselves and there are technologies that came from technology developers on all fronts. Applying it or not applying it is a matter for the industry to determine.
I didn't really have a cause and effect here. It was just a general statement.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
I have one question about the bead technology. We've been looking at possible applications to other spills. Is the water temperature a variable in its effectiveness? In other words, could this be used, say, in an Arctic spill?
President, Gradek Energy Inc.
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°.
The reason the viscosity comes into play is because of the physical transportation of the soil particles onto the bead. That is relative to the viscosity. Peeling chewing gum off of a warm sidewalk versus when it's -30° has a different effect. What we're talking about is the same thing.
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Francis Scarpaleggia
Thank you very much. That was very interesting testimony.
That closes our day of hearings.