I’ve owned Petrobank (PBEGF), a TSE oil junior, at $50, sold it as the market tanked, and over the past few months I’ve been buying it again in greater quantity in the teens.  It’s now just over $20.  I’ve been impressed with management’s apparent ability to successfully execute a standard “exploration and production” strategy as exemplified by its Bakken and it’s Columbian programs.  Beyond that, I’m fascinated with the huge speculative upside potential of the technologies it has developed for harvesting heavy oil more economically and environmentally.  

The stock may not …

[Read more →]

As the Globe and Mail reported today, the Alberta government has issued its first ever restriction on the amount of water that oil sands producers can withdraw from the Athabasca River.   I don’t know the extent to which this could limit production by the four companies that are impacted, which includes Canadian Oil Sands Trust (COSWF).  But it seems like a straw in the wind.   Such limits represent a risk to most oil sands producers and to the potential future rate of flow of oil from the oil sands.  …

[Read more →]

Our current investment trauma marks the end of an era of excesses in credit and real estate markets, of course.  But it also denotes that the United States is undergoing a far more general and significant transition - not only to a new government with a radically different agenda, but more lastingly into a whole new climate for investments. 

Gone is the era of wind-to-the-back investing powered since 1982 by continually lower interest rates and the virtuous influence of the baby boomer demographic bulge working its way through the U.S. economy …

[Read more →]

I recently discussed the reasoning behind my owning shares of PetroBank (PBEGF).   In a recent edition of Value Investor Insight, Passport Capital’s Laurance Narbut explicated the case more thoroughly.   The Long Case for Canada’s Petrobank by: Value Investor Insight posted on: September 29, 2008 | about stocks: PBEGF.PK   Why is Canada’s Petrobank [PBG:CN] one of your favorite energy bets? Laurance Narbut: The company is based in Calgary and has three primary areas of operation. The first is in the Bakken …

[Read more →]

I own shares of PetroBank (PBEGF) for two reasons.  First the company has been doing a credible job of buying and exploiting conventional oil and gas resources.  In Q2 it reported diluted EPS of $1.92 ($C) vs. $0.26 based on 23.9k boe production vs. 6.9k in Canada and Colombia.  Just based on those results, the companies $45 price per share seems well supported.  But the main reason I own the stock is that the company has developed two related new technologies for exploiting deep deposits of heavy oil and bitumen …

[Read more →]

Some mayors in Canada are working to halt coal bed methane drilling because the toxic water produced in the process may be polluting local waters according to the report posted below from the Financial Post.  They say the employment benefits are small compared with the risks to fishing, recreation, and health.  One company affected is PetroBank (PBEGF) which I own because of its patented technologies for extracting oil from deep deposits of tar sands in a move economical and environmentally benign way.    Stop drilling, B. C. mayors …

[Read more →]

The July 7, 2008 Oil and Gas Journal features several pieces on the Canadian oil sands.   I’m not going to attempt to summarize it all; much is technical information regarding the various ways to treat bitumen which is what you get out of oil sands before starting to refine it.   Interested persons can get a copy on line or by mail.

Let me simply summarize a few points that are relevant to  investors. 

  First, total Canadian oil sands production is expected to grow from the current 1.32 mb/d to 3.23 mb/d …

[Read more →]

Just a quick note that there are two potentially game changing technologies for extracting liquids from deep oil sands where mining is not appropriate.  The incumbent method, SAGD - steam assisted gravity drainage.  As the name describes it calls for burying two parallel pipes, heating a liquid in the top one which then heats the sand below it, which liquifies the bitumen in the sands which then drips into the lower pipe from which it is brought to the surface.   That requires a lot of natural gas for heating …

[Read more →]

An extensive research report published in the Globe and Mail discusses the importance of water to extracting oil from the oil sands.  A key assertion is this: ” The degree of water use directly reflects the quality of ore recovered, says Bruce Peachey, president of New Paradigm Engineering in Edmonton. “We are presently mining the best ores. But as clay content increases, the volume of water needed in production will increase. So this is the good time for water.”

Water may well be a limiting factor in the growth of oil …

[Read more →]

PetroBank Energy and Resources Ltd. (TSX:PBG), which plans to expand its foothold in Alberta‘s oilsands next year, will be able to do so at half the cost of other operators thanks to its patented technology, the company‘s vice president for heavy oil said Monday.

read full article

[Read more →]

Petrobank Plans C$225 Million Oil-Sands Project (Update2) By Ian McKinnon Dec. 21 (Bloomberg) — Petrobank Energy and Resources Ltd., the best performing energy stock this year in Canada, plans to spend C$225 million ($226.4 million) to develop an oil-sands project in northern Alberta. The first commercial phase of the Whitesands project will be designed to produce 15,000 barrels of oil a day from Alberta’s tar-like deposits, Chief Executive Officer John Wright said in a telephone interview. Output will eventually be expanded to as much as …

[Read more →]

Press Release - 28 November 2007 Massive Canadian oilfield could be exploited using new UK system A new method developed in Britain over the past 17 years for extracting oil is now at the forefront of plans to exploit a massive heavy oilfield in Canada. Duvernay Petroleum is to use the revolutionary Toe-to-Heel Air Injection (THAI™) system developed at the University of Bath at its site at Peace River in Alberta, Canada. Unlike conventional light oil, heavy oil is very viscous, like syrup, or even solid …

[Read more →]

Air injection is officially underway at the first ever field pilot of a technology that proponents say could replace steam assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) as the production method of choice for unconventional oil in situ. However, although toe to heel air injection (THAI) could hold great promise for the future of Alberta’s oilsands, if successful its potential applications could stretch far beyond the borders of the Western Canada Sedimentary Basin (WCSB). read full article

[Read more →]

Petrobank Energy and Resources is producing oil using a patented new process called toe to heel air injection (THAI) that’s been developed in a remarkably short time. Read full article

[Read more →]

THAI™ is a evolutionary new combustion process, that combines a vertical air injection well with a horizontal production well. read full article

[Read more →]