Evidence of meeting #24 for Natural Resources in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was make.

A recording is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Jim Carter  President and Chief Operating Officer, Syncrude
Tony Clarke  Director, Polaris Institute
Mark Shaw  Vice-President, Oil Sands Sustainability, Suncor Energy Inc.
Rob Seeley  Vice-President, Sustainability and Regulatory Affairs, Albian Sands Energy Inc.

5:30 p.m.

President and Chief Operating Officer, Syncrude

Jim Carter

I'm not sure how Pembina arrived at its numbers. All I can do is tell you about our numbers at Syncrude that are measured. We target to reduce the water consumption, and there's a really simple reason for that, quite frankly. It costs money to store water. We have to build these huge tailings storage facilities that have to be built on earth-filled dam standards, and it costs money to do so.

It's a little bit like the energy thing. It makes economic sense for us to reduce our consumption. I can assure you that I know what numbers we have done at Syncrude. We steward to those quarterly with all of my people, and it's just slightly over two barrels per barrel of synthetic crude oil that we make, and that's down by 60% from where it was five years ago. But I don't know how Pembina has calculated theirs.

5:30 p.m.

Conservative

The Chair Conservative Lee Richardson

We have heard witnesses make that accounting several times, so that's useful, and I thank you.

We have beaten the bell today. We have a vote in House. The bell is ringing now.

I want to thank everybody for coming and for the amount of time you've given us in preparation for the meeting, and also for the questions. I think it's been very helpful for the committee, particularly after having gone and visited the site. The questions are becoming more relevant, and that puts a little more pressure on the witnesses. I thank all of you for coming today.

With that, we will adjourn until Thursday.