Wildfires Return and Threaten Canada’s Oil Sands Once Again

As many as 47 new wildfires were reported in Alberta over the past 24 hours, as extreme heat and dry weather are currently fanning about 150 wildfires in Canada’s oil-producing province.

Fire bans and alerts of severe fire threats are in place for many areas close to oil sands producing sites.

In May, a fire that was out of control came within 3 miles of Fort McMurray, the unofficial capital of Canada’s oil sands, leading to the evacuation of 6,600 residents.

The wildfires returned in full force in July, disrupting some oil sands output and threatening to disrupt more.

“When it’s mostly hot and dry, thunderstorms can lead to wildfires. Most new wildfires in July have been caused by lightning,” Alberta Wildfire said on Wednesday.     

Early on Thursday, an evacuation alert was issued for residents of the hamlet of Janvier. An evacuation order has not been issued. This is an alert for residents in the affected area to be ready to leave on short notice, the regional municipality of Wood Buffalo said.

Oil sands producers Canadian Natural Resources, Imperial Oil, and MEG Energy are closely monitoring the current situation in Alberta as wildfires are currently raging within 6-7 miles of some of their production sites.

Earlier this month, wildfires in northern Alberta continued to disrupt some oil sands operations as Cenovus Energy demobilized non-essential staff at its Sunrise project as a precaution amid heat and wildfire alerts in the area.

In early July, Suncor shut down an oil sands project in Alberta amid wildfires. The Firebag project has a capacity of 215,000 barrels of crude daily. Suncor said that it would keep the site ready to return to full operation as soon as possible.

Two months ago, authorities in Fort McMurray issued an “extreme” wildfire danger for the forest area that could threaten to shut in or disrupt some Canadian crude oil or natural gas output in the coming weeks.

Indeed, the wildfires shut down some production at the time but it was quickly brought back online.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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