1) Tar sands extraction requires lots of energy, typically natural gas. the Mackenzie Valley pipeline proposal to feed natural gas into the tar sands, is DOA.
2) The Alaskan Hiway natural gas pipeline proposal is also DOA.
3) The Keystone XL pipeline proposal has been stalled for at least 3 years.
4) The Northern Gateway pipeline proposal has been stalled for nearly 5 years.
5) Tar sands developers facing a pipeline bottleneck have turned to shipping by rail car and barges.
6) Tar sands developers have resurrected 2 shelved proposals for pipelines to the Atlantic coast in the face of no major pipeline progress elsewhere in North America.
If you can't bring in more energy needed to expand tar sands production and you can't build pipelines from the landlocked tar sands to the ocean, then you have a production bottleneck.
“The pipeline capacity story is complex, but it is clear that Keystone XL and Enbridge Northern Gateway are critical to support the proposed level of expansion industry wants,”
From: Pipeline bottleneck may force slowdown of Tar Sands
So oil companies have pulled 2 pipeline proposals off the shelf, one goes to New Brunswick, the other to Portland Maine.
The Energy East would move tar sands oil from Alberta to the coast of New Brunswick, Canada. Using an existing natural gas pipeline that must be converted to oil, existing oil pipelines and building new pipelines to connect all the pieces, Energy East would be able to deliver 850,000 barrels a day to a New Brunswick port on the Atlantic.
Formerly called the Trailbreaker, a pipeline proposal dating from 2009, was put on hold due to the economic downturn. Now Enbridge has resurrected the Trailbreaker proposal and in November of 2012 Enbridge filed the Applications to reverse the flow on the line 9B pipeline, and an expansion of line 9. The 9B and B pipelines may be the most limiting factor with a limit of 150k to 200k bpd. The Portland Montreal pipeline was opened in 1941 and has a 600k bpd capacity. Not exactly Keystone East, but the system is old and should be considered a short term solution
From:Keystone East: Doubling down? Or admitting KXL defeat?
Well the economy is no better, so whats the reason they brought back Trailbreaker?
One possible reason is the lack of progress regarding adding pipeline capacity elsewhere in North America. Because the big picture is the oil companies are down to rail car and barge shipments, and their plan is to ship 5 to 8 million barrels a day to markets.
And then last Thursday UNIFOR, Canadas largest private sector labor union signed the Fraser Declaration.
an accord that aims to ban all tar sands projects from First Nations territory and from the ocean migration routes of the Fraser River salmon. In a speech, Gavin McGarrigle, Unifor’s B.C. director, said a “good jobs revolution,” with opportunities in clean energy and expansions in public transit, would bring better opportunities to B.C. than the pipeline would.
From: Largest private sector union in Canada: No to Northern Gateway pipeline
The Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline cant get to the port of Kitimat without going thru First Nations lands.
Game on Enbridge, UNIFOR just drew a line on the Tundra, I expect Enbridge to put up a big fight for the Northern Gateway pipeline, and the proposed supertanker loading facility because it would open up the Asian markets to tar sands oil.
Put the tar sands down, step away from the tar sands.......