pipeline news august 2014

PIPELINE NEWSAugust 2014 FREE Volume 7 Issue 3

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Photo by Brian Zinchuk

First on the site:Surveyors

Oil show Preview A3

CarsonDonation A5

CarnduffResponds B8

INSIDESECTION A4 Lloyd mayor bullish on oil show

5 Ron and Shirley Carson donate $500,000 to CT scanner

6 Editorial

7 Opinion

11 Viking drives $100M pipeline

12 AECOM buys URS, parent company of Carsons

16 Floods blindside CAODC forecast

19 Ditch Hitch tow system

24 Oil show survey

SECTION B1 Give blood, go into surveying

4 Do-All Industries assets go on

6 Rain idle rigs

7 Researching Sask oil economy

13 Surveyor knows who to cheer for

14 Before anything happens, surveyors are there

18 Tromping through crops that

20 Staking out the oilpatch

22 There's an app for that

PIPELINE NEWSSept. 2014 Focus CRUDE-BY-RAIL

SW SASK.

A2 PIPELINE NEWS August 2014

TOP NEWSA3PIPELINE NEWS August 2014

By Geoff LeePipeline News

Lloydminster – The 2014 Lloyd-minster Heavy Oil Show is sold out with a record 260 exhibitors ready to display the latest industry technol-ogy and services to as many as 7,000 visitors.

Unlike the last show in 2012 that attracted 216 exhibitors and 5,500 visitors, there will be no major turn-around at the Lloydminster Husky Upgrader this year to compete for hotel rooms.

“We increased the show this year because Lloydminster is supposed to have 341 new hotel rooms,” said Paul Klaassen, chair of the Oilfield Techni-cal Society organizing committee.

“The number of exhibitors is a lot higher. We had two exhibitors cancel from the last show that took up 40 booths, so we filled those with 40 new exhibitors, plus we extended the show by 32 booths.

“This show will have the biggest number of booths and the biggest number of exhibitors.”

Organizers have added eight ad-

ditional outdoor booths and 24 new indoor booths to what will be the fifth heavy oil show in Lloydminster.

The event will be held at the Lloydminster Exhibition Grounds Sept. 10-11 in conjunction with a series of technical presentations set up by the Lloydminster chapter of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE).

“We complement each other,” said Klaassen, who is the manager of PWM Steel.

“I think it’s going to be a good show. Hopefully, what we really want is for the oil companies to let their employees come to the show.

“The show is put on for the oil companies. We need the oil compa-nies to let their people come and see the new technology or see what ser-vices are out there that they can use.”

The Lloydminster show precedes the World Heavy Oil Congress com-ing to Edmonton in March 2015, putting heavy oil technology devel-oped and deployed in the Lloydmin-ster area in the global spotlight.

International attendance at the Lloydminster show is expected to

at least match the 52 visitors from eighth foreign countries that came to the show in 2012 .

“Heavy oil is part of the equa-tion,” said Klaassen. “They’ve got technologies nowadays for lifting the heavy oil out plus they are finding it so much better that they were 20 years ago.”

The show theme, Pipelining Technology Forward, is reflected in the SPE technical presentations to take place throughout the show in the Prairie Room.

The opening day will feature a talk by Noralta Technologies Inc. titled, Increasing Netbacks by Apply-ing Digital Oilfield Technologies to Heavy Oilfield Operations.

Tartan Canada Corp. will speak about Developing a Win-Win Main-tenance Strategy while Blue Spark Energy Inc. will wrap up the first day with a presentation called, Shake “n” Bake Your CHOPS Reservoir.

The technical symposium con-cludes on Sept. 11 with a talk by NOV Mono Artificial Lift Solutions titled, Extending Production Life of Heavy Oil Wells Using Hydraulic Pumping Units.

Klaassen says what attracts com-panies like his to set up a booth at the biennial show is the quick return on investment in networking, exposure and potential sales.

“It’s a good show to be in. It’s economically feasible compared to Calgary. We’re probably 25 per cent of the cost of Calgary,” he said.

“The volunteer committee keeps costs down. A lot of the equipment gets donated which keeps our costs down.”

Klaassen says being at the show is a great opportunity for his com-pany to let people know they also do powder coatings in addition to being a recognized retailer of new and used steel scrap.

“It’s just great networking. Where else do find that many potential clients coming to see you? They just want to talk to someone who knows

something about the company. “You may not generate sales right

away. but all of a sudden you get a new customer three months after seeing you at the oil show. You swap business cards, right?

“I believe more in the face-to-face and telephone conversations as compared to e-mails and texting even though that’s the way the world is going. I gotta adapt to that too, but I still believe in face-to-face.

“You find out we’ve been around since 1982, so we are not a fly-by-night company,” he said about being at the show.

“It’s really good because where else are you going to have 6,000 peo-ple – where else are you going to have that many stopping by to see you?”

New this year is a regional direc-tory of charter busses for companies in areas such as Kindersley, Kerrobert and Provost to send their employees to the show for a one day return trip.

“We’re trying to keep the qual-ity people up. We’re trying to get the people to come,” said Klaassen.

There should be a full house for the opening ceremonies and evening banquet at the Stockade building on Sept. 9 featuring guest speaker Ed Connolly, senior vice president heavy oil for Husky Energy.

Connolly is expected to talk about Husky’s plans to double thermal pro-duction in the Lloydminster area by 2019 and what they could mean for area companies.

The show will also include an evening supper social on Wednesday, Sept. 10 at the Stockade building with comedy provided by Big Daddy Tazz.

“We started that last time and it was pretty successful so we’re doing it this year,” said Klaassen who noted the evening is great for out of town hotels guests.

“A lot of people are buying cor-porate tables for Wednesday night, so they can take their customers out at the end of the Wednesday show.”

Page A11

-

Sold out Lloyd oil show a whopper

BRIEFS

Briefs courtesy Nickle’s Daily Oil Bulletin

A4 PIPELINE NEWS AUGUST 2014

Sundance Energy Cor-poration has successfully completed a merger with Ceno Energy Limited to form a new company Ceno Energy Ltd.

Th e merger by a reverse takeover was approved by the shareholders of Sundance and Ceno at the respective meetings of Sundance and Ceno shareholders held on June 13.

Th e Ceno deal triggered a related fi nancing for gross proceeds of $10 million via the issuance of 21.72 mil-lion common shares of new Ceno at a price of 46 cents per share.

New Ceno will be a Calgary-based oil and gas company incorporated with assets in Alberta and Sas-katchewan, principally in the Baxter Lake, Kidney, Sturgeon Lake and Panny areas of Alberta, and in the Gull Lake and Standard Hill areas of Saskatchewan.

Sundance and Ceno merge

By Geoff LeeTh e 2014 Lloydminster Heavy Oil

Show & Technical Symposium to be held Sept.10-11 at the Lloydminster Exhibition Grounds is expected to attract more than 6,000 visitors from around the world. Th e show is held every second year and has be-come an economic bellwether of the state of the regional industry and economy which looks strong heading into the 2014 show. Pipeline News asked Lloydminster Mayor Rob Saunders for his opinion on some of the impacts of the heavy oil show on the growth of the local and regional economy.

PN: Do you see the heavy oil show as a benchmark to measure the progress and health of the oil and gas economy in the area?

Saunders: Absolutely. Th e oil and agriculture industries are kind of driving the economy in this part of the world.

We are not immune to world eco-nomics, but even through the last down-turn in ’09 and ’08, Lloydminster heavy oil just chugged right along, so there is a great future in heavy oil.

PN: How you would describe the economic climate for heavy oil heading into the 2014 oil show?

Saunders: It’s great. Th e number of drills that are being done this year is more than last year. Th ey continue to have ag-gressive drilling programs and bring on new production.

All that new production adds up to a lot of volume of product and, of course,

that’s why the future is focused on trans-mission to get the products to market.

PN: What eff ect does the high price of oil have on the economic climate of the industry?

Saunders: It’s a great scenario to have reasonable pricing. Th e peaks and valleys aren’t as deep as they use to be, but we’ve maintained a fairly good medium pricing over the last little while.

Th e diff erential prices are quite good for the Lloydminster Husky Upgrader.

PN: What is the impact of the show on Lloydminster’s reputation as a cen-tre for innovation?

Saunders: I think it’s got a fantastic reputation. People look forward to com-ing to Lloydminster for the oil show. It’s a show that’s specifi c to heavy oil.

It’s a show where there is a tremen-dous knowledge base in the expertise and technical aspects and the knowledge of heavy oil.

PN: What is the overall short term impact of the heavy oil for the city of Lloydminster?

Saunders: In the short term, Lloy-dminster is a recognized hosting centre and a natural regional service centre and the home of heavy oil expertise.

PN: What are some other short term impacts of the show on the local economy?

Saunders: Th ere’s an immediate im-pact in the economy for people getting ready for the show and preparing their

displays and their equipment and getting their new innovations ready to share with the industry.

Th ere are all kinds of infl ux of in-mi-gration of people fl ocking into the show that particular week in September.

Of course, all the hotels fi ll up. I be-lieve in the past we’ve fi lled every hotel in the city of Lloydminster and surrounding area as far as Vermilion and Wainwright and all points around the city within a 60 to 90-kilometre radius.

PN: Is the demand for hotel rooms during the show partly behind the re-cent construction of three new hotels and a major expansion of another in Lloydminster?

Saunders: Th at’s kind of the long term impacts of some of these oil shows. Some of these shows have shown an in-creased demand for hotel accommoda-tions.

Th e whole (oil) industry itself has grown exponentially in the region and the demand for service workers coming to work in the industry has created a re-ally high demand for hotel rooms.

PN: What is the impact of the oil show on air traffi c at the Lloydminster Municipal Airport?

Saunders: I am sure the fl ights will be “plumb full.” Th ere are many people that come in from long distances and of course, there is a huge Calgary compo-nent that comes and goes on a regular ba-sis. Page A9

Lloydminster Mayor Rob Saunders is bullish on the short term and long term economic impacts of the upcoming 2014 heavy oil show

“As fast as we can build houses they are consumed. As fast as

we can identify growth areas for service, commercial and

industrial areas they are being consumed.”

- Lloydminster Mayor Rob Saunders

Lloyd mayor bullish on oil show spinoffs

BRIEFS

Briefs courtesy Nickle’s Daily Oil Bulletin

A5PIPELINE NEWS August 2014

www.scopeproduction.com24 Hrs Service780-875-0715

Northern Spirit Re-sources Inc. has targeted its 2014 well drilling program in the Sparky formation in the Provost Alberta area near the Saskatchewan bor-der.

Th e Calgary-based company reported it had spent $4.4 million on devel-opment drilling in 2014 in the Klein and Codogan ar-eas in an operational update on July 17.

Th e publicly traded company owns 23,300 gross or 16,700 net acres (26 sec-tions) in the area of which 7,600 net acres are undevel-oped (12 sections).

Th e company expects to see initial production rates in August from four (3.5 net) horizontal wells drilled in the north and south Klein areas in the fi rst six months of 2014 along with one (0.9 net) vertical well drilled.

Th e company also re-completed one net vertical well at Codogan in June with estimated production commencing in early Au-gust.

All of the 2014 newly drilled wells targeted Sparky medium gravity oil and all have been drilled and cased to full planned depth.

Northern Spirit drills near border line

By Brian ZinchukPipeline News

Lampman – On June 27 Estevan’s St. Joseph Hospital an-nounced it would be receiving a computerized tomography, or CT scanner, the only one in southeast Saskatchewan. Th e St. Joseph’s Hospital Foundation would be seeking $2 million to establish the new CT scanner, and they already had several do-nations in place. Th e key donation was $500,000 from Ron and Shirley Carson.

Ron Carson has headed up Carson Energy Services for four decades. It was sold to Flint Energy Services in 2011, but he has still headed up the division for the past three years. Th e company has been the subject of two more mergers since then.

Th e money was presented on July 16. Pipeline News spoke

to Ron Carson in his Lampman offi ce on that day, joined by representatives of St. Joseph’s Hospital.

Noting that there isn’t yet a CT scanner in the area, Carson said, “Th ey were raising money in other ways that I was involved with. I asked them if it would be a good place for me to possibly give back to the community.”

Th e government, he noted, also announced ongoing fund-ing to operate the CT scanner.

Asked the reason behind the donation, he replied, “I spent 52 years in the oil industry in Saskatchewan, some of it in Al-berta, some in Manitoba, but mostly Saskatchewan. Forty years of that was at Carson Energy Services. I look at it as a way I can give back to the communities that supported it (Carson Energy Services). Page A10


Ron and Shirley Carson donate $500,000 for CT scanner

EDITORIAL

Publisher: Brant Kersey - EstevanPh: 1.306.634.2654

Editorial Contributions: SOUTHEASTBrian Zinchuk - Estevan 1.306.461.5599

SOUTHWESTSwift Current 1.306.461.5599

NORTHWESTGeoff Lee - Lloydminster 1.780.875.5865

Associate Advertising Consultants:SOUTHEAST SASK. & MANITOBA

Cindy Beaulieu Candace Wheeler Kristen O’Handley Deanna Tarnes Teresa Hrywkiw

Alison Dunning

NORTHWEST SASK. & ALBERTA

Krista Thiessen

CENTRAL Al Guthro 1.306.715.5078

SOUTHWEST

Stacey Powell

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Published monthly by the Prairie Newspaper Group, a divi-sion of Glacier Ventures International Corporation, Central Office, Estevan, Saskatchewan. Advertising rates are available upon request and are subject to change without notice. Conditions of editorial and advertising content: Pipeline News attempts to be accurate, however, no guarantee is given or implied. Pipeline News reserves the right to revise or reject any or all editorial and advertising content as the newspapers’ principles see fit. Pipeline News will not be responsible for more than one incorrect insertion of an advertisement, and is not responsible for errors in advertisements except for the space occupied by such errors. Pipeline News will not be responsible for manuscripts, photographs, negatives and other material that may be sub-mitted for possible publication. All of Pipeline News content is protected by Canadian Copyright laws. Reviews and similar mention of material in this newspaper is granted on the provision that Pipeline News receives credit. Otherwise, any reproduction without permis-sion of the publisher is prohibited. Advertisers purchase space and circulation only. Rights to the advertisement produced by Pipeline News, including artwork, typography, and photos, etc., remain property of this newspaper. Advertisements or parts thereof may be not reproduced or assigned without the consent of the publisher. The Glacier group of companies collects personal infor-mation from our customers in the normal course of business transactions. We use that information to provide you with our products and services you request. On occasion we may contact you for purposes of research, surveys and other such matters. To provide you with better service we may share your information with our sister companies and also outside, selected third parties who perform work for us as suppliers, agents, service providers and information gatherers.

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Mission Statement:Pipeline News’ mission is to illuminate importance of Saskatchewan oil as an integral part of the province’s sense of community and to show the general public the strength and character of the industry’s people.


Call it what you will, but southeast Saskatche-wan and southwest Manitoba is going to have to get used to working in wetter conditions.

Rains the last weekend in June walloped both sides of the border region extending from the U.S. border to east central Saskatchewan. When you combined the highway road closures maps from both provinces you saw a huge swath of road closures. Except for Highways 1 and 16, the southern portions of both provinces were essentially cut off from each other.

This was immediately reflected on the active drilling rig counts, as the flood zone cut off essen-tially all the Manitoba oilpatch and a good chunk of Saskatchewan’s. Even if the highways hadn’t been under water or washed out, the RM roads were quickly slapped with road bans.

Three weeks later things were slowly getting back to normal in Saskatchewan. Most of the highways were open, but not necessarily to heavy trucks due to temporary bridges in some places. Manitoba was an-other story, as the main north-south corridor, High-way 83, was hobbled at Melita with flood-related bridgework.

The oilpatch stepped up to help out. One of the worst areas hit was in the extreme southeast corner of Saskatchewan, where Gainsborough then Car-ievale saw evacuations as they were cut off by ris-ing waters. Talking to Kris Carley, the emergency

Might need some “mudder” tires

measures co-ordinator in Carnduff who himself runs an oilfield business, he explained that no one person or company could be singled out for its contribution, because everyone helped. It’s a question he got a few times.

Asked if there was anyone who didn’t step up, the answer was no.

Beyond flood response, we have to start looking forward to the future. It is quite clear now that the sup-posed one-in-500 year flood of 2011 was no fluke. The upper Souris River valley near Estevan was not affected in the same way, but the lower Souris sure was. A drive by Melita on July 20 was evidence of that.

Rural municipalities and provincial highways min-istries need to take a good look at our infrastructure and start building it to handle substantially more water. After two events like this in three years, we have a good idea where the problem areas are. The next time it hap-pens we shouldn’t have to cut roads to deal with it. If that means bigger culverts, more of them, or rebuilding bridges, then do it. No town should become an island.

As for the oilpatch, we’re going to have to get used to mats. Mats, mats and more mats. We’ve heard that corporate Calgary has been increasingly considering this region a winter drill area. That’s a little ridiculous. We’re not drilling on muskeg, for goodness sake.

It might mean some more rubber boots, “mudder” tires, and a tow rope in every truck if you don’t have one already.

PIPELINE NEWS INVITES OPPOSING VIEW POINTS. EDITORIALS AND LETTERS TO THE EDITOR ARE WELCOME.Email to: [email protected]

OPINIONA7PIPELINE NEWS August 2014

Patience is a virtue. That could be

Enbridge’s motto over the coming months as they wage a battle to meet the 209 conditions set by the Joint Review Panel before construction of their $7.9 billion oil pipeline would begin.

The company also has to meet five safety and environmental protection conditions that British Columbia laid out before the province issues all of their 60 or so permits.

In addition, there are numerous court chal-lenges from environmental and Aboriginal groups opposing the project and negative public opinion to tackle as well.

It’s not surprising to hear Enbridge say it won’t make a make a decision on sanctioning the pipe-line until many of the hurdles have been cleared.

In Enbridge’s favor is muted support from the B.C. government provided their conditions are met and First Nations participate in the economic benefits of the pipeline.

B.C. Premier Christy Clark has the sense to recognize the economic benefits of the pipeline provided those benefits don’t come at the expense of the environment.

Conversely, her province too often values the environment at the expense of the economy put-

ting low paying tourism jobs ahead of industries such as mining, logging and oil and gas.

I say that having lived in many communities in B.C. where the scenery was wonderful but without the jobs to support the view.

It’s encouraging to see the B.C. government make major moves to develop a liquid natural gas industry including Kitimat where new oil terminal facilities will be built if Gateway is constructed.

The oil and gas industry is the leading eco-nomic driver in Canada and B.C. needs to hop on the bandwagon and connect to those benefits that will also flow to everyone.

It’s also time for First Nations along the route to ask themselves if they want to rely on control from Ottawa or have the opportunity to be masters of their own destinies with jobs and revenue shar-ing that the Gateway will generate.

Enbridge must consult with over 100 First Na-tions before construction can begin. There will be plenty of opportunity for First Nations to step up to the plate and state their case

Those who just want to protest to stop the pipeline will get absolutely no economic benefit if their efforts result in Enbridge throwing in the towel – but the view will be nice.

The view is nice in Alberta too, but people have jobs and some of the best high paying jobs are in

the oil and gas industry with taxation that supports schools and hospitals and infrastructure.

It’s time that B.C. understood that oil pipeline development can be done in a safe environmentally responsible manner and the 209 conditions by the Joint Review Panel and the five by B.C. will make it happen.

Will there will oil spills? Yes, just as there are human caused forest fires in B.C. That province has some of the best forest fire equipment and crews in the world to deal with those inevitable emergen-cies.

The province will have a world class oil spill response system in place when oil spills happen too as one of the five conditions Enbridge must meet.

Just as it is in B.C. when it comes to respond-ing to the threat of forest fires, Enbridge must develop oil spill prevention, response and recovery systems to manage and mitigate the risks and costs of heavy-oil pipelines.

Forest fires are bad for the scenery and econo-my too and take decades to re-grow an economic stands of trees.

There’s a lot more value to be added to the B.C. economy from a continuous flow of oil and revenue by shipping Alberta oil to Kitimat for sale in new global markets than waiting 80 years for a tree to grow and restore the view.

B.C. to choose oil or scenic unemployment

It’s remarkable to me how our industry can so quickly become used to high oil prices.

There was a time a few years ago, when asked about activity level in the Saskatchewan oilpatch, I would respond like this:

“If oil is below $50 per barrel, it’s dead as a doornail.

“From $50 to $65, it shows some activity.“From $75 up, it’s all go, no quit, crazy busy.”I specifically remember passing along that

little bit of what I thought was wisdom while sit-ting in my SUV in Alida, talking on the phone to someone who had called me. They urgently wanted to know how the activity level in the oilpatch would impact housing in Estevan and the Bound-ary Dam carbon capture project.

There was a time about seven years ago when I asked the provincial minister of finance, upon the presentation of his budget, “Oil is at $60 a bar-rel! What are you going to do with all that royalty money?”

A few years later, and it looks like my guide-lines don’t count for much anymore. These days, $100 oil simply isn’t a big deal.

We’ve been running at oil prices around $100 and over for quite a while now. As I type this on July 22, the NYMEX-WTI August price is listed

at US$104.59 per barrel. Yet no one in recent months has told me they were “crazy busy.” Few have even said they were busy at all, and that was before the rains in southeast Saskatchewan and southwest Manitoba put the brakes on most field work for much of July.

It’s as if $100+ oil doesn’t count for much any-more. Instead of the industry eager to go full bore to take advantage of the situation, it has offered up a collective “Ho hum” and pulled out its 9-iron for the next shot. No pressure here.

Now, don’t get me wrong. In many ways, this is a good thing. People in the industry actually get to take summer holidays again. There isn’t as much pressure to go-go-go all the time. But some people, I think, yearn for the heady days of 2008, then 2010 to 2012. More specifically, their wal-lets may yearn for those days to pay for a higher standard of living established then.

I wonder what it would take to see the pace of those years return? Would it be $120 oil? $130? $140? Or would it take push of developing a new play, perhaps the Torquay, along the U.S. border. That’s where we are starting to see some of the most intensive activity right now. Today there are eight rigs drilling south of Highway 18 between the Port of Oungre and Port of Estevan. Nearly all

are right along the border, with one cluster of three within spitting distance of each other.

I refuse to buy the argument that weather is the determining factor. I will stipulate is a very important contributing factor. As we’ve seen in 2011, weather and wet conditions can be overcome eventually if the desire, and money, is there to do so.

Insurrections in Iraq and Ukraine haven’t had much impact on the price of oil. One wonders what will? Is the market simply tired of reacting to Iraq already? Or perhaps it shouldn’t have gotten all worked up in the first place?

With the media reporting the emergence of “Saudi America” and now Russia looking at developing its shale plays, the talk of “peak oil,” shortages and related price spikes seems to have vanished. Yet oil is still quite high, despite this abundance of new supply.

In the meantime, the industry seems to have mellowed out just a bit. I wonder if one could use sales of energy drinks as a barometer, in addition to rig counts?

Brian Zinchuk is editor of Pipeline News. He can be reached at [email protected].

$100 oil? Not many people get excited about that anymore


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Page A4I believe those today

are pretty full on any given day. Of course, there are private planes and jets that are utilized to come in. We welcome all visitors to the show.

PN: Does the show help to highlight the need to expand services at the airport?

Saunders: Abso-lutely, we’re looking for regional support for our airport. The growth of the city and region really depends on the economic growth of the airport and the ability to support the growth.

The air traffic and

the ability to ship busi-ness services and people by air out of this region is highly important for our growth.

PN: Does the city get a lot of feedback from oil and gas com-panies following these heavy oil shows?

Saunders: Well mainly we’ve become a planning and engi-neering function where they are looking for new shop space. They’re looking to relocate some of their service entities.

They are looking to invest in real estate. They’re looking to move their employees, so they

are looking for housing. And of course, they are looking for those core services that the city provides.

PN: What does the heavy oil show convey to industry about doing business in the city?

Saunders: I think we’ve really seen from the corporate capital investment from the major service corpora-tions that Lloydminster is a great place to set up a corporate regional service centre.

We’ve seen that time and time again. We continue to see large dollar investments by oil and gas production and oil service companies.

You could list a half a dozen names of the largest players in the industry and they’ve established significant investments for their facilities out of this region.

PN: What does the show say about the po-tential for more growth of the industry?

Saunders: Well it shows that it’s got a great future. When we look at the projections going forward, the oil production in Western Canada is to double over the next 30 years.

It’s very similar to the projections of the growth study that was done for the city. Over the next 30 years, there’s an expectation the population will double.

So we will continue to see investment in the industry. We will con-tinue to see a migration of population coming to support the indus-try and working in the industry.

We’re attracting people from right across the country. We’re hop-ing as a city we can sup-port that going forward.

PN: What is the effect of oil industry growth on housing and industrial parks?

Saunders: As fast as we can build houses they are consumed. As fast as we can identify growth areas for service,

commercial and indus-trial areas they are being consumed.

We have proposed notice of annexation with surrounding mu-nicipalities to accom-modate both growth mainly for residential but for industrial and commercial as well.

PN: What role will you play as mayor dur-ing the heavy oil show?

Saunders: Usually the mayor is invited to address the guests and visitors at the banquet. I always look forward to that.

Having working in the industry myself for a long time I get to visit with a lot of the people that I worked with and keep abreast of the new technology and the new innovations.

Lloydminster a corporate regional service centre

The Lloydminster Heavy Oil Show, held every second year, has become a benchmark of economic growth for the oil and gas industry and for the city of Lloydminster.

Services, now a Schlumberger company, is one of iconic images from the last oil show in 2012.


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Page A5

“I’m told it will make some diff erence, and maybe save some lives. I think it’s a good place to do it,” Carson said.

“I have to give back to the communities for the support (in the past) and for the sake of our employees. I’m glad to do it to such a worthy cause.”

He noted a recent donation was made to the Hospitals of Regina Founda-tion for $100,000, part of a matching donation program with Mosaic.

Th e new facility will be known as the Ron and Shirley Carson Diagnostic Centre.

Greg Hoff ort, executive director and CEO of St. Joseph’s Hospital, said the plan is to have it complete in 2015. A request for proposals is expected to go out right away.

Th e new scanner will be located within the hospital, with space located within the diagnostics centre. “We’ll be doing some renovations. Th at’s a big deal. It’s a high-tech piece of equipment that needs lead lining in the rooms,” Hoff ort said. “It’s got its own cooling system and environmental system.”

“Th e key thing, once it’s up and running, is the operations. To that end, we have our fi rst CT technician on staff . He just completed his training. We will be recruiting future radiology staff with CT training,” he said.

Th e interpretation of the scans will be done by specialists in Regina. “You don’t need a radiologist on site. Th ey can be anywhere in the world. Th at image can be sent through electronic means. Our radiologists will be in Regina.

“It terms of St. Joseph’s Hospital getting this, it’s the fi rst in Saskatchewan outside of a regional hospital. It’s a big deal. We’ve been working hard at this for a couple years, and we’re thrilled. We’re hoping it will lead to bigger and better things.

“It was certainly a huge decision for the Ministry of Health, because they haven’t done it anywhere else like it.

“Visits at our hospital correlate with how busy the oilpatch is. When the oilpatch is slow, things slow down in our ER (emergency room),” Hoff ort said. “Th is is a tool for internal injuries, for head traumas, for stroke. As it relates to the oilpatch, it is that kind of service that much closer to the oilpatch.”

He noted that there is a very small window of time to get a stroke victim into a CT scanner and diagnose what type of stroke it is. Th is is crucial, because administering the wrong type of treatment can be disastrous. “Th e chances of a stroke victim in Oxbow having a successful outcome are not good.”

Even car accidents can require a CT scan, Hoff ort noted.“Th ere’s a lot of physicians in Estevan who need this as a diagnostic tool,

for any number of illnesses, rather than go to Regina to confi rm what they think they know in Estevan. One physician in town said it will change the nature of the way medicine is practiced in Estevan.”

“As for how important the oilpatch is to making this happen, this donation made it happen. It really did.”

Approximately $1.3 million had been raised by mid-July.Th e founding donation of $60,000 came from Steve and Dorothy Yoner

and a further $100,000 from the Mainprize Manor Foundation. Municipalities have come together pledging a total $500,000.

Hoff ort noted it will help everyone in the whole region. “It is, for certain, something that benefi ts the whole region.”

Shirley Carson said, “I didn’t know anything about it until he told me not too long ago. I said, ‘Th at’s wonderful.’

“You never know when you might have to use it.”Ron Carson said, “It’s really nice to be able to donate to something like

this. I’ve been thinking for a long time, I have to do something. I have to do more than this, but I don’t know where, or what I am going to do yet.”

“I’ve been in the oilpatch for 52 years, 40 years with Carsons. All those communities supported our people for years. You have to give back, if you can, and I can, so I better do it.”

Hoff ort said, “Th e Carsons have made this possible. Th ey made it a cer-tainty.”

Giving back to communities that have supported Carsons over the years


Inter Pipeline Ltd. is undergoing a $100 million expansion of its mid-Saskatchewan light

system.

Viking oil drives $100 M pipeline build

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Light System Expansion

Calgary – Increased drilling activity and rapidly growing light oil production in the Viking play have prompted Inter Pipeline Ltd. to un-dertake a $100 million expansion of its mid Saskatchewan pipeline system.

Th e expansion program an-nounced July 10 will involve the construction of over 50 kilometres of new mainline pipe and 40 km of new pipeline laterals and associated pump-ing and metering facilities.

“Th is high return investment is the largest expansion of a conven-tional oil pipeline system in our com-pany’s history,” stated Christian Bayle, president and CEO of Inter Pipeline in a statement.

“It provides a capital-effi cient

transportation solution for our cur-rent customers as well as operational fl exibility to accommodate signifi cant future growth.”

Th roughput volumes have dou-bled to over 70,000 barrels per day over the last two years with much of the mid-Saskatchewan system operat-ing at or near full capacity.

Th e mid-Saskatchewan system includes heavy oil and light oil pipe-lines and facilities.

Inter Pipeline expects the new mainlines to initially operate at less than 50 per cent capacity, with utiliza-tion rising over time as area produc-tion increases.

In 2013, there were over 1,000 wells drilled and put on production

in the Viking formation compared to 300 well completions in the Bakken play in southeast Saskatchewan.

Once the new pipelines are in service, approximately 95,000 bpd of new capacity will be added to the system to handle oil volumes from the new battery connections and provide capacity for future third party connec-tions.

Th e Calgary base company ex-pects the expansion to enter commer-cial service in phases beginning in late 2014 with the project fully completed by the second quarter of 2015.

Th e work will build and connect new system pipelines and facilities including the Smiley, Coleville, Ker-robert and Dodsland stations along the route.

Five oil producers have entered into ship or pay contracts to backstop the project with terms ranging from four to 10 years.

Th e new agreements are expected to generate approximately $25 million to $30 million in incremental EBITA (earnings before interest, taxes, de-preciation, and amortization) on an annual basis for Inter Pipeline.

Page A3Lakeland College

energy program stu-dents will also attend the fi nal day of the show as usual to view some of the latest heavy oil technology.

“Enrolment is up. Where else can you make good money? You get educated and hope-fully you get an oilfi eld jobs,” said Klaassen.

“Between Lakeland College and whoever is donating money, they’ve really upped the pro-grams there to facilitate the needs of the oil companies.”

Klaassen also thinks the show is a great opportunity for the public to learn about the positive safety and environmental aspects of the industry and its economic impact.

Th ere is no charge to attend both days.

“If it wasn’t for heavy oil – you just think about a town of about 30,000. We have every truck dealership in this town. Why, because it’s trucks and it’s oil-

fi eld,” said Klaassen.Th e show can also

open the doors to new career opportunities in the industry for some show goers.

Klaassen recalled a rotary club member who bartended during the 2012 banquet and quit his job after hearing the guest speaker from Devon and went on to became a power engi-neer at Husky.

“It’s another way of hiring people too and seeing what you do. It’s an employment op-portunity too for a lot of the companies,” said Klaassen.

When contacted on July 8, Klaassen said it was too early to tell what PWM would be exhibiting this year, but he hinted there will be some reference to their powder coating service started about four year ago.

“We do a bunch of powder coating. We powder a lot of stuff and it’s all ready for the show,” he said adding the show is good for

business.“It’s huge. Every-

body puts their best foot forward,” he said.

Sold out oil show


Proudly serving Lloydminster Area for over 20 Years

By Brian Zinchuk

Lampman – Th ere’s always a bigger fi sh, ready to swallow up the smaller ones.

Th ree years ago Flint Energy Services pur-chased Lampman-based Carson Energy Services. Eight months later, Flint was then purchased by URS Corporation. Now, on July 13, AECOM Technology Corp. has purchased URS.

Ron Carson, along with several managers, fl ew to Calgary July 15 to meet with senior management regarding the most recent takeover.

Speaking to Pipeline News the following day in his Lampman offi ce, Carson noted in September it will be three years since the sale of Carson Energy Services to Flint Energy Services. He broadly hint-ed he would soon be pulling back from running the business he built over the course of four decades.

“I said I would stay until the transaction was working as well as expected,” he said, noting that as of mid-July, there was just two-and-a-half-months to go in the three years since the buyout.

Th e purchase agreement specifi ed a three-year “earnout” of $10 million for the shareholders, including senior management, of Carsons for each

year earnings targets were met. Carson said they met their targets for the fi rst two years and year three is coming to an end.

“I don’t know if I’ll quit then or not,” he said. “I may go to the end of the year. It just depends if our people need my support.

“If I was guessing, I’ll be phased out at the end of the year. Our people are doing it all now. I’m here only to support them and our region, the east region. As far as operations-wise, our area managers are handling it very well.”

He noted that while larger facilities, like White City, have had the URS name go up, the smaller ones haven’t seen new signage yet. It’s just as well, since URS has now been purchased.

“We have a new owner, potentially a new owner. It’s going to happen, but it’s going to take the rest of ’14 to get it done. We’re going to have a name change, again.

“What I’m pushing for is, I believe we need to retain our brand name – a division of the new company. Whether or not that will happen will take time to see. But I was in Calgary yesterday. I’m suggesting that, but I’m only a small piece of the action.

“It’s in the stages. We think it’s going to hap-pen, but it’s subject to a lot of approvals,” Carson said.

“We see absolutely nothing that is going to change in our world,” he said, noting URS, and now AECOM, were new to the oil and gas industry.

“Our people won’t see any change. But at the same time we’re trying to compete against our com-petitors, so we still like the idea of our brand name, a division of.”

Noting he is gradually stepping back, he said, “I’m 71 years old. What the hell am I doing here?”

Carson was chair of the Saskatchewan Oil and Gas Show for six years, but 2013 was his last year for that role as well.

Deal specifi csAECOM Technology Corporation and URS

Corporation announced on July 13 the execu-tion of a defi nitive agreement under which AE-COM will acquire all outstanding shares of URS for a combination of cash and stock valued at approximately US$4 billion or US$56.31 per URS share, based on the AECOM closing share price as of July 11, 2014. Including the assumption of URS debt, the total enterprise value of the transaction is approximately US$6 billion.

In a joint press release, the companies stated, “Th e combined company will be a leading, fully in-tegrated infrastructure and federal services provider with more than 95,000 employees in 150 countries. It would have calendar year 2013 pro forma rev-enues of more than US$19 billion and EBITDA of approximately US$1.3 billion.”

“Th is combination creates an industry leader with the ability to deliver more capabilities from a broad global platform to reach more clients in more industry end markets,” said Michael S. Burke, AE-COM president and chief executive offi cer. “Clients, employees and stockholders of both companies will benefi t from the opportunities created by these expanded capabilities, broad global reach in key growth markets and economies of scale. In one step, we will dramatically accelerate our strategy of creat-ing an integrated delivery platform with superior capabilities to design, build, fi nance and operate infrastructure assets around the world.”

Martin M. Koff el, chairman and chief executive offi cer of URS, stated, “Th is is a compelling strate-gic combination that we believe will benefi t our cli-ents, stockholders and employees. URS stockhold-ers will receive signifi cant, immediate value from the transaction and will be able to participate in the future prospects of the combined company, which we expect will be better positioned to compete for major, complex projects across a diverse range of end markets and geographic regions.”

Page A13

AECOM buys URS, parent company


Providing the following services:

Stable Foam Cleanouts Horizontal Wells Disposal Wells Foam Hammer Drilling N2 Foam Cleanouts High Temperature Foam Cleanouts Gas Well

Well Blow Downs Power Tong Repairs Coil Trucks - From ¾ - 1½ Vac Trucks & Semi Vacs Pressure Trucks Hydrovacs Hydro Tests

Ron Carson was recently in Calgary to learn about the third takeover of Carson Energy Services in three years.

of Carson Energy Services

Page A12

Koff el continued, “Our two businesses are complementary, and our cultures are highly compatible. We anticipate that employ-ees from the combined company will benefi t as the organization integrates its leadership talent and capitalizes on its greater scale to invest in its people, improve their career opportunities and ad-

vance their capacity to compete globally.”

Terms of the

Transaction

AECOM will pay US$56.31 per URS share, based on AECOM’s closing price on July 11, 2014, representing a premium of 19 per cent over the trailing 30-day average closing price of URS shares ending July 11, 2014. URS stockhold-ers will receive per share consideration

equal to US$33 in cash and 0.734 shares of AECOM common stock for each URS share. URS stock-holders may elect to receive all cash or all stock consideration, subject to proration in the event of oversub-scription. Th e election will be subject to a customary proration mechanism to achieve an aggregate consider-ation mix of approxi-mately 59 per cent cash

and 41 per cent AE-COM common shares. Th e stock portion of the consideration is expected to be tax-free to URS stockholders.

AECOM stock-holders will retain

their shares following the consummation of the transaction. Upon completion of the transaction, URS stockholders will own shares that account for approximately 35 per

cent of the combined company, which will allow URS stockhold-ers to participate in the prospects of a business that is well positioned to create long-term stockholder value.

NOW HIRING

Proposed AreasLloydminster area land owners Henry Keichinger,

at city hall on June 19. The city would like to annex


By Geoff Lee

Calgary – Earth-master Environmen-tal Strategies Inc. is expanding the use of phytoremediation tech-nology in Saskatchewan using plants to remove hydrocarbons and salts from contaminated soil at oilfield sites.

The Calgary-based environmental consult-ing company is lining up new projects in the province for its phytore-mediation technology called PEPS that pro-motes vigorous above and below ground plant growth.

Earthmaster has been commercially us-ing PEPS successfully

since 2007 across Can-ada and the Northwest Territories to remediate soil at contaminated oilfield, commercial and industrial sites.

“We are starting about 10 to 15 new sites in Saskatchewan. We are just doing some pre-liminary work, but we’ll be getting after those sites probably either this fall or next spring,” said company president and soil scientist Perry Gerwing.

“It’s going to be mostly salt, but there will be two or three sites that will have associated hydrocarbon contami-nation.”

Earthmaster is undertaking new similar

phytoremediation projects using PEPS in other parts of Western Canada.

PEPS combines plant growth promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) with enhanced scientific and agricultural tech-niques developed by the University of Waterloo and Waterloo Environ-mental Biotechnology Inc. in Ontario and Earthmaster.

“It’s a really old technology – phytore-mediation – but when we developed PEPS, we put a new twist on it by discovering the PGPR (root colonizing bacteria) and coupled it with better science and practices that work best with the plants,” said

Gerwing.Some older phy-

toremediation systems used slow growing trees and shrubs that don’t develop enough root biomass to effectively remove contaminants from soil.

“Ours is kind of a switch in that we can get the plants to grow fast on contaminated sites and they take up the contaminants and or degrade them a lot more quickly,” explained Gerwing.

Seeds are treated in a controlled environ-ment with strains of PGPR which are natu-rally occurring plant

growth rhizobacteria isolated from Canadian soils.

“We extract them and test them in the lab for their efficiency at making plants grow and doing what we need them to do,” explained Gerwing.

“Once we find the bacteria strains we need, we grow the bacteria, treat the seeds with the bacteria then plant the seeds.”

PEPS will also remediate soluble trace metals from soil, but Earthmaster is targeting oilfield lease sites where soil is mainly contami-nated by hydrocarbons and or salt.

“That’s the major-ity of the cleanup work that’s happening in Western Canada and where we do most of our work,” said Ger-wing.

Widespread indus-try usage of phytoreme-diation and other new technologies are being held back by cheap landfills costs in West-ern Canada, but Ger-wing said using plants to remediate large volumes of contami-nated soils better for the bottom line.

“If you look at southeast Saskatchewan and the older oilfields, there are lot of brine pits and ecology pits and a lot of saltwater contaminated soil,” he said.

“A lot of times the contaminated soil vol-umes are from 10,000 to 100,000 cubic metres on any one site in certain areas. It’s not economi-

cally viable for the oil companies to start dig-ging all that material up and landfilling it.

“A lot of the oil and gas companies out there are looking for an option that will allow them to clean up their sites but for a reason-able price.”

PEPS is being touted as a cost-effec-tive in-situ technique for remediation of hydrocarbon and salt contaminated soil with distinct advantages at remote sites.

Earthmaster has about nine oilfield sites currently being treated by PEPS in Alberta and some remote muskeg sites in the Northwest Territories.

“If you look at remote sites in forested areas and winter haul conditions – because you can’t get in during the summer – you’ve got a lot of safety issues with dangers such as trucks going off the roads,” said Gerwing.

“There’s all this back and forth hauling to a landfill and you end up with a big hole at your site with the contami-nated soil still remain-ing, but at a different location.

“All we have done is moved the problem. With phytoremedia-tion, all we have to do is take seed to the site; we plant it and the soil is treated on-site.

There’s a lot of greenhouse gas savings, but there’s also a lot of safety issues that are eliminated.

Page A15

Earthmaster uses plants to remediate soil


Page A14

“We can just fl y our seed in with a little bit of equipment and we’re set to begin treating the soil,” said Gerwing.

“So what would cost a client $10 million to landfi ll over long winter ice roads, we can prob-ably treat for $750,000.”

Most oilfi eld sites can be treated with phytoremediation over two to three growing seasons to remediate hydrocarbons and from three to 10 years for salt

contamination depend-ing on volumes.

“A lot of times we do dig up soil, move it and prepare a secure treatment area where we deploy PEPS,” said Gerwing.

“Th e treated soil then gets put back into the hole. Th at’s still way cheaper than hauling the contaminated soil to a landfi ll.”

At each site the soil is tilled and fertilized prior to seeding typi-cally with a mix of tall fescue, annual ryegrass and perennial ryegrass.

Tall wheatgrass, oats, red fescue, slender wheatgrass and barley are also employed and harvested each year until remediation is complete.

Th e goal of phy-toremediation is to meet respective provincial site remediation guidelines like Tier 1 or Tier 2 standards.

“If we treat the soil and we’re still not

at that Tier 1 level, we might conduct a Tier 2 toxicity testing pro-gram and show that the treated material is safe without need for further treatment,” said Ger-wing.

“You can still get your certifi cate of recla-mation.”

Earthmasters’ phytoremediation services are growing but currently represent about fi ve per cent of the company’s workload with their growing list of services and clients

across Canada.“Th at’s just one of

our tools in our tool-box,” said Gerwing.

“We don’t want to be labeled as just a phy-toremediation company as that is only a very small part of what we provide for services.

“At oil and gas sites, we can take an abandoned site with facilities, remove the facilities, conduct all necessary environmen-tal assessment, reme-diation and reclamation work and obtain a fi nal certifi cate of reclama-tion. Th e leased land can then be returned to the landowner.

“We deal with contaminated site as-sessment, cleanup, spill response and fi nal site reclamation.”

Earthmaster also provides many other services such as formal environmental impact assessments for new or existing large or small

scale projects and wet-land issues from fi eld locations in Carlyle, Kindersley, Medicine Hat, Hanna and Edson.

Gerwing said what makes Earthmaster stand out is having the PEPS technology and providing clients with high quality, cost-eff ective solutions for their environmental problems.

“We are always looking at the bottom line for the client – what’s going to be best for the clients from an

environmental stand-point and from a cost standpoint,” he said.

“With PEPS, we are a carbon capture company. We can capture about six tonnes of carbon dioxide per hectare on any project in a year.

“We are not gen-erating greenhouse gas. We are sequestering it.”

Gerwing said if you are landfi lling contaminated soil, you are just moving your liability to another spot and generating a lot of greenhouse gases in the hauling process.

“With PEPS you are remediating or cleaning the soil so you are actually recycling

or are able to reuse the soil,” said Gerwing.

Gerwing said PEPS has a lot of growth po-tential in Europe where the company recently attended a trade mis-sion.

“Th ere was a lot of interest in our phytore-mediation technology so we’ve been doing some follow up with them,” he said.

“In Europe, there are a lot of contaminat-ed sites. Our technology has a lot of viability over there.”

Earthmaster con-tinues to work with its Ontario research and development partners to improve PEPS.

“A couple of things

we are looking at is adding slow release oxygen compounds and other types of products like surfactants to help make contaminants more ‘bioavailable’,” said Gerwing.

“We are starting to do some experimenta-tion with other products in combination with PEPS to see if we can speed up the phytore-mediation process.

“We are also con-ducting toxicity tests to assist in establishing more liberal site spe-cifi c cleanup guidelines plus we are working to improve laboratory ana-lytical protocols for use when we deploy PEPS in the fi eld.”


Calgary – The Canadian Association of Oilwell Drilling Contractors may have to rethink its revised drill-ing forecast for 2014 in the wake of flooding in southeast Saskatchewan and Manitoba in late June and early July.

CAODC increased its projected well count for 2014 to 11,494 wells based on a strong sec-ond quarter and higher natural gas prices – with wet summer weather not factored in.

The revised forecast calls for 890 more wells to be drilled in 2014, an 8.3 per cent increase from CAODC’s previ-

ous 2014 forecast of 10,604 wells released last November.

“Stronger gas prices have increased cash investment to the industry,” said CAODC president Mark Scholz in an update to the as-sociation’s drilling and service rig membership from Calgary on June 25.

“This is the stron-gest second quarter we’ve seen in seven years.”

The updated fore-cast was issued just days before torrential rain swamped some com-munities in southeast Saskatchewan and parts

of Manitoba, prompting CAODC to take pause.

“Rain has slowed activity in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. I guess we would need to take a closer look at that towards the end the summer,” said Nancy Malone, vice president of operations on July 7.

The Assiniboine River crested near Por-tage la Prairie, Manitoba on July 9 and again in mid-July as floodwaters from the river travelled east toward Winnipeg.

Despite the flood-ing, Malone said there were no gas wells in Manitoba, a very small handful in Saskatch-

ewan, with Alberta and British Columbia producing the majority of gas activity.

“In terms of per-centage, while it is busy in Manitoba and Sas-katchewan, there is still a significant amount of activity in Alberta and B.C. that could carry the activities,” said Malone.

“We will be paying close attention to that to make sure we’re not missing out on that.

“I haven’t spoken to anyone in Saskatchewan in the last couple of weeks – I was out there – I’m not sure what we’re seeing looking ahead for the summer for work. I know ev-eryone is really focused on getting through the floods part.”

CAODC’s spring update is usually based on fist quarter activity when industry is busiest and weighs emerging trends that may impact the rest of the year.

A stronger than expected second quarter along with indications that shallow gas wells will figure slightly more prominently in 2014 than in 2013, compelled CAODC to increase its 2014 well count projec-tions.

Natural gas prices

reached a high of $6.40 per million cubic feet on Feb. 20.

The revised forecast assumes an average gas price of $4per mcf for the year that should keep activity levels strong in Alberta and B.C.

“It’s only as steady as commodity prices would be but there is no indication we are going to see a significant drop. They are holding pricing steady,” said Malone

“The market is an-ticipating things will be pretty steady. It’s $4.50 today.”

Natural gas drilling in B.C. is expected to remain strong as that province ramps up its LNG industry.

“Most of the gas drilling is focused around B.C. with progress driving a lot of the work up there,” said Malone.

“It’s just with the gas prices taking a little bit of a bump (up) that we have seen some increase in that area.

“We hear with the LNG projects being proposed the operators are looking to fill the potential LNG pipelines and plants and that sort of thing.

“They are looking for it. They are doing that exploration piece. They’re testing out and developing the territory.”

The revised 2014 forecast shows ac-tual first quarter activity statistics and revised projections for the re-mainder of 2014.

The new projected 2014 well count of 11,494 is a 6 per cent increase over the final 2013 well count.

“Oil and gas pro-ducers are benefitting from investor optimism. And that means more wells will be drilled. It’s a good news story. It means more rig activity and more jobs across Canada,” said Scholz.

CAODC expected the industry would easily surpass 17,000 operating days when the official numbers were crunched at the end of the quarter on June 30.

That’s well above the second quarter num-bers for the last seven years that ranged from 8,411 in 2009 to 16,369 in 2011.

In the first quarter, rig utilization in western Canada averaged 64 per cent with 521 rigs active out of a fleet of 809. The number of operat-ing days for the quarter totaled 44,721.

The revised 2014 forecast projects second quarter activity to be 23 per cent utilization with a total of 17,342 operat-ing days.

This is an increase from the 19 per cent utilization rate and 14,230 operating days originally forecast for 2014.

Third quarter activ-ity is projected to be 45 per cent with 33,818 operating days.

Fourth quarter ac-tivity is projected to be 48 per cent with 36.072 operating days.

CAODC president Mark Scholz has increased his asso-


Summer Savings

Chicago – Th e Canadian Border Services Agency is investigating al-legations of dumping and subsidized imports of certain oil country tubular goods called OCTG into Canada.

Th e investigation by CBSA began on July 21 following a complaint fi led by Canadian steel makers Evraz North America Inc. in Regina and Tenaris Canada in Calgary.

Both companies allege that the dumping of OCTG is harming Canadian production causing every-thing from lower prices, lost sales, and market share to loss of jobs, reduced profi ts and negative eff ects on capital investment.

“Evraz has been detrimentally im-pacted by the unfair trade practices of these countries,” said Conrad Winkler, president and CEO of Evraz North America in Chicago in reaction to the CBSA probe.

Evraz currently employs over 2,300 people in Canada across recy-cling, steelmaking, and pipe making operations.

“We are eager to compete with OCTG manufacturers around the globe based on product quality and actual economics rather than foreign government subsidies and foreign manufacturers’ dumping practices,” said Winkler.

CBSA will investigate alleged injurious dumping of OCTG origi-nating in or exported from Chinese Taipei, India, Indonesia, the Philip-pines, the Republic of Korea, Th ailand, Turkey, Ukraine, and Vietnam.

Dumping occurs when goods are sold to importers in Canada at prices that are less than their selling prices in the exporter’s domestic market or at unprofi table prices.

Th e investigation will also focus on alleged harmful government sub-sidies of certain OCTG originating or exported from India, Indonesia, the Philippines, the Republic of Korea, Th ailand, Turkey, Ukraine and Viet-nam.

Th e Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development and the steel industry have estimated there were nearly 600 million net tonnes of steel overcapacity globally in 2012, largely the result of foreign govern-ment trade-distorting policies and

practices. In Canada, the Special Import

Measures Act protects Canadian pro-ducers from the damaging eff ects of such unfair trade.

As of June 30, 2014, 43 such measures are in force, covering a wide variety of industrial and consumer products.

Th e Canadian International Trade Tribunal is undertaking a preliminary inquiry to determine whether the im-ports are harming Canadian producers and will issue a decision by Sept. 19.

Meanwhile the CBSA will inves-tigate whether the imports are being dumped and or subsidized, and will make its preliminary decisions by Oct 20.

Th e tribunal has the power to apply retroactive anti dumping and countervailing duties to July 21 if it determines a large volume of harm-ful imports has occurred prior to the CBSA’s decision

It the CBSA decides certain im-ported OCTG are being dumped or subsidized, a fi nal decision will follow 90 days after the preliminary decision.

“Th e steel industry will continue to closely monitor the level of imports for any surges, in order to ensure that duties are applied retroactively to the initiation date of CBSA’s investigation if warranted,” stated Winkler.

Th e Canadian steel industry has invested billions of dollars to create new and innovative steel products for growing domestic oil and gas markets.

“As a major producer of OCTG with a long history in Canada, Evraz would like to continue investing and supporting economic development through the creation of more good, well-paying jobs for Canadians,” Win-kler added.

“However, unfairly traded and subsidized imports are currently mak-ing it extremely challenging to do so. We look forward to a thorough inves-tigation from the Canadian govern-ment and we trust in their ability to enforce existing trade laws.”

Th e investigation will terminate if the CBSA determines margin of dumping or amount of subsidy is insignifi cant or that the actual and potential volume of dumped or subsi-dized goods is negligible.

Regina.

Evraz helps force steel dumping probe


2004 Cat IT38G 2006 JD 624K Aspen Tri Lowboy

Gerrys Lowbed & Jeep 2000 JLG 600S 2004 Bobcat 322 2006 JD 624K

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2010 Komatsu D65PX 2009 Komatsu D61PX

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By Geoff LeeCalgary – A stuck

pickup truck in the mud or snow won’t stay stuck for long with the Ditch Hitch vehicle recovery system designed for a shock load.

That’s a promise from Vern Sparkes, the product inventor and president of Ditch Hitch in Calgary.

His company’s product is in high de-mand from the oil and gas and utilities indus-tries as a safe and easy to use vehicle recovery system for remote or off road towing in all seasons.

“Very brisk” is how Sparkes describes sales of Ditch Hitch in Western Canada and northern U.S. states.

“Probably within the next year to two years, we will be the industry standard for vehicle recovery in the oil industry,” said Sparkes in an interview from Calgary.

Several workers have been killed and

seriously injured by un-safe towing devices and practices.

“Unofficially, we are the industry standard in my opinion because everybody’s using them,” said Sparkes.

“Anybody that uses the Ditch Hitch system has eliminated towing-related incidents 100 per cent.

“We’ve got 20,000 systems out in the industry right now without fail and without incident in 10 years, so it’s proven itself.”

Ditch Hitch is a truck to truck system that retails from $585 and comes with two hitches that attach to a standard frame mounted receiver on the recov-ery truck and the stuck truck.

“That’s the only way we sell them now because if a guy has one, he’ll tie onto something that isn’t safe,” said Sparkes.

“So our system has to be from Ditch Hitch to Ditch Hitch only.”

The pulling is done by a two inch by 25 foot long nylon fuse link strap that connects to a pivoting U-bar on the Ditch Hitch unit.

The Ditch Hitch used along with the fuse link strap eliminates the danger of flying metal objects such as chains, slings with tail chains,

shackles or tow ropes with hooks commonly used during vehicle recovery.

Ditch Hitch also eliminates the need to

attach to points such as trailer balls or bumpers that are not made to withstand shock load forces in vehicle recov-eries. Page A20

-

Ditch Hitch shock load tow a lifesaver


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Page A19

The fuse link strap is engineered with a breaking strength of 19,000 lbs. while the aluminum Ditch Hitch has a breaking strength of 78,000 lbs for a four-to-one safety ratio.

“We make sure that if anything from the system fails, the strap fails and nobody dies,” said Sparkes who just launched a new fail-safe fuse link protector called the Snap Trap.

“These fuse link straps, when they let go, they’ve got enough kenetic energy that could knock a grill out of a truck or a tail light” said Sparkes.

The fuse link strap feeds through the Snap Trap which also hooks on to the U-bar pivot on both trucks.

“When that fuse link strap lets go – it’s doing its job if it fails. We want it to fail before anything else in the system fails. When it fails, the snap trap

captures the strap,” explained Sparkes.

Husky Energy, Encana, Shell Canada, Atco Electric and Talis-man Energy are among the major companies that have has purchased the Ditch Hitch system for company wide use in Western Canada.

“It’s now written right into their policies and procedures,” said Sparkes.

“Right now I am talking to SaskPower. SaskPower is super interested.

“Some of these companies are now mandating all of their contractors to use them as well. Some of these oil companies use a Ditch Hitch or they call a tow company. That’s the only thing they can do.”

Sparkes got the idea for the Ditch Hitch after working for 15 years as a safety consultant for oil and gas companies all over the world.

Ditch Hitch is

nominated for this year’s prestigious Manning Award that recognizes and supports Canadian inventors who have marketed their innovations.

The company is eligible for one of four awards to be presented this fall from the top $100,000 award to a

$10,000 innovation prize.

“If you win the Manning it’s mostly recognition,” said Sparkes who said he would “pay some bills” if prize money comes his way.

The company pay-roll includes Sparkes’s wife as vice-president

and his daughter as production foreman and quality control manager with part-time employees hired to fill large batch orders.

Sparkes brought a Ditch Hitch to a Lloydminster commu-nity safety event held at Target Safety Services in May and he is on a

waiting list for a booth at the upcoming Lloy-dminster Heavy Oil Show Sept. 10-11.

Sparkes also pitched his safe re-covery system during the Petroleum Safety Conference in Banff in May as he tries to do every year.

Page A21

Vern Sparkes, president of Ditch Hitch, the name of a vehicle recovery system he invented, displays a pre-job check-

Lloydminster safety event at Target Safety Services in May. File photo

Receiver-to-receiver tow strap


... ON THE

MARK WITH

TARGET

Page A20“It’s pretty cool. I’ll be standing

there talking to a potential customer and somebody will come by that uses our product and they just look at the people and say ‘don’t even think about it – just buy it. It’s the best thing on the planet,’” said Sparkes.

“That happened twenty times.”Ditch Hitch is mostly targeted at

businesses, but consumers who have used the system at work are also buy-ing them for recreational purposes.

“Guys that are hunters, camp-ers and fishermen they get stuck out there all the time,” said Sparkes.

“They use these things at work and they say ‘why don’t we have them for our own personal vehicle’ so they buy them.”

Ditch Hitch is patented in Canada, the U.S. and Australia and comes in a carry bag with the complete system weighing just 20 lbs.

The package includes a reflec-tive Visi-Sleeve to

illuminate the recovery strap along with a pre-job check list.

“When people rig up our system they put the Ditch Hitch in each of the vehicles. They put the fuse link strap in there then they go down the pre job checklist,” said Sparkes.

“They make sure both trucks have framed mounted receivers and the linchpins and the lock pins are in place so they’ve got all their ducks in a row.

“We’ll both sign off on it. It becomes a legal document after that time. It’s a consent form as well.

“After they’re done with the tow, the white copy goes to the safety department and the yellow copy stays in the book.”

The user instructions advise the rescue vehicle to make two attempts at pulling the stuck truck with no

slack in the system.“If someone’s not

stuck too bad and you have a four wheel drive, you can

just pull them

without shock loading,” said Sparkes.If that doesn’t work, he recom-

mends taking two, four foot runs and if that doesn’t work, take two, six foot runs for more shock loading.

“If you take two, six foot runs and the truck just moves inches, then just carry on with six foot runs,” said Sparkes.

“This is what we call the necessary evil. Most times in vehicle recovery you need to back up. You need some momentum to shock load the other vehicle.”

Calling a tow truck is the last resort to recover a stuck truck on relatively flat land but a tow truck is

advisable if the recovery truck is in a ditch.

“We don’t recommend people pull other people out of the ditch because you might cause a bigger problem,” said Sparkes.

“The Ditch Hitch is what we recommend when people get stuck on a prairie trails or on an oil location – they’re stuck in the mud, the snow the sand, and it’s on level ground.

“If a guy’s in the ditch, leave that to a tow truck. I don’t recommend people use our system for pulling a truck out of a ditch. They could flip a truck over on its side or something.”

The all aluminum Ditch Hitch truck to truck recovery system is nomi-nated for this year’s Manning Award for Cana-

dian innovators. The top prize to be awarded

this fall is $100,000.

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Lloydminster – Dynamite Oil-field Services Inc. is on a growth tear following a reorganization of opera-tions in Lloydminster, Lacombe and Drayton Valley.

The boom is triggered by the merger last July of Dynamite Oilfield & Picker Service owned by Kris Bex-son in Lloydminster and Dynamite Oilfield Central Alberta owned by his brother Shawn in Lacombe.

Shawn’s operation manager, Devin Hoffer, also owns a stake in the consolidated business that provides a growing array of picker, bed truck and hot shot services and oilfield rentals to new and existing customers.

“We are fairly diversified and we can deploy a number of units to wherever we need,” said Kris about the new company.

“Our new clients seem to be happy with what we are doing for them. It all boils down to service. We take pride in servicing our clients and that’s showing great response on the growth.

“The motherboard of our com-pany is trucking. That’s our mainstay. It’s 90 per cent of what we do.”

The merger melded Kris’s light picker and hotshotting services in Lloydminster with Shawn’s fleet of heavy haul bed trucks, winch tractors and larger cranes based in Lacombe and fluid hauling out of Drayton Val-

ley.“It just made sense,” said Shawn

in a phone interview from Lacombe. “We wanted to move heavy

equipment in the Lloydminster area and establish a footing there just be-cause it’s a busy area, and I wanted to diversify my business here in central Alberta.

“Kris was more into the mainte-nance and we are steering him away from the maintenance end and we’re getting into more of the trucking and heavy hauling.”

Shawn is the CEO and general manager at Dynamite’s head office in Lacombe while Kris is the operations manager in Lloydminster. Rod Young is the operations manager in Drayton Valley.

“Company-wise, we are over 30 employees. We’re hoping to be around 40 by the end of this year,” said Shawn.

Lloydminster is targeted for growth with the ongoing construction and purchase of a new 11,000 sq. ft. facility in the Hill Industrial Park that could be ready for occupancy by late fall.

“It will give us a good foothold in Lloydminster. People will start recognizing us as a long-term service company,” said Shawn.

“We want to establish roots in Lloydminster. We’re thinking of 15 to

20 years.“The future potential will depend

on the activity. If the activity level stays strong, I am sure we will be able to possibly double the size of our existing business there in the next two years.

“We’re diversified now in La-combe, Lloydminster and also in Drayton Valley.”

Right after the brothers hatched their merger plan Shawn relocated the Lloydminster operations to leased space in the Hill Industrial Park with a nearby yard for new heavy haul and

rental equipment.“We are renting a yard for all of

our trailers and our rental equipment and rig matting. So we’re spread out. It’s going to be very nice to get that new facility,” said Kris.

“We’re going to be able to main-tain our equipment a lot better and make it a nicer place for our em-ployees to work. It’s going to help to retain good employees.

“Also we’re going to have a lot of room for expansion in this new facil-ity – bringing in more equipment as we need it.” Page A23

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Page A22“We should have the yard tuned

up in the next month. Hopefully, by the end of June we’ll be able to get out of our rental yard and utilize our land over there.”

Dynamite Oilfi eld rents ev-erything from safety trailers, 40 ft. tandem hi-boys and 30 ft. gooseneck trailers, to skidded 50/50 drilling rig shacks, 400 barrel tanks and pipe racks.

Dynamite Oilfi eld in Lloyd also rents 8x20 and 8x40 ft. rig mats and a mobile cat walk system for laying out pipe on service rigs.

Th e Lloydminster shop even rents an 18 cube portable pit for excess ce-ment returns.

In Lacombe, Dynamite rents some light tower, mats, a fuel skid and a portable road system.

A four metre wide by 25 me-tre length of mat can be laid out in minutes from a feeder attachment on a wheel loader and joined to other sections to form a roadway.

Th e PRC Mammoth mat is rein-forced by galvanized steel wires and bars and provides minimal ground disturbance for heavy hauling over a variety of terrain.

“We’ve really expanded. Th e rent-al business is something we’re looking into and expanding into slowly,” said Kris.

“Our main focus is trucking. We have a couple of winch tractors and everything from 8-ton knuckle pick-ers to 45-ft. cranes.”

Heavy hauling from Lloydminster

is aided by a Texas bed truck which is a tri-axle winch tractor with a live roll on the back for spotting matting and 400 barrel tanks.

Th e local fl eet includes a tandem winch tractor and an array of trailers from hi-boys, low-boys and scissor-necks.

With the reorganization of Dy-namite, Lloydminster crews are now hauling skidded drilling rig equip-ment, fl oc tanks, matting, 400 barrel tanks and well site shacks all over Western Canada.

“We’re getting to Fort Mac, Estevan and Weyburn,” said Kris who expects 2014 to be another strong year for the company as it’s been since the merger

“I see great potential over the next year. We are really seeing the benefi t of having the two bases.”

Operating as one company makes it easier to shuffl e equipment and manpower around to where the work is or to fi ll in for employees on vaca-tion.

“It’s something we don’t do a whole lot of, but when the time comes and you need to do it, it’s an option,” said Kris.

Th e Drayton Valley and Fox Creek area has become of the busiest areas for Dynamite in Lacombe since they began hauling oil and frac fl uids there last winter.

“We’re servicing that area right now. It’s the most active,” said Shawn who started his business in 2002, one year after his younger brother Kris in Lloydminster.

“I’ve been here for 11 years and it’s going really well.”

Shawn built a new 12,000 sq. ft. offi ce and storage facility in Lacombe last year and plans are afoot to build a base facility in Drayton Valley.

“Shawn is a very good business-man and he built a very nice com-pany,” said Kris which made merging a no brainer decision.

“He approached me last year probably 14 months ago and said ‘We should join up and really have a big company’ instead of two small ones.

“I thought about for about a day and said ‘Sure, let’s do it.’ We thought this was the better way to go and so far it’s proven to be a good thing.

“It’s nice to be part of something like this and it’s nice to be able to work with my family and build a

company that is recognized through-out the provinces in the oilfi eld.”

Dynamite Oilfi eld’s decision to construct a new fl agship building in Lloydminster follows the growth mode of several other well established oilfi eld companies in the area taking the next step in expansion.

“You always wonder if you are doing the right thing, but you got to keep growing and growing with your customers and clients as well,” said Kris.

“As they grow, they expect you to grow with them. You’ve got to do that or you fall behind.

“Growth is exciting and you always hope you are not going to see a slowdown right around the corner.

“I am quite confi dent that we’ve got a good year ahead of us.”


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Lloydminster –They have their iPads locked and loaded with sur-vey questions to target exhibitors during the Lloydminster Heavy Oil

Show at the exhibition grounds Sept. 10-11.

Staff from the Lloydminster Economic Development Corpora-tion will be surveying oil show exhibitors to estimate the economic

impact of the event on the local economy.

They will also work with BR films to produce video footage and testimonials from exhibiting oil compa-nies on the advantages

of doing business in Lloydminster.

The projects will help the corporation lay the groundwork to for a comprehensive eco-nomic survey in 2016 originally intended to

be acquired from the Conference Board of Canada for this year’s show.

“We’re trying to put a dollar figure on the economic impact of the show,” said economic

development officer Katlin Ducherer during one of two interviews.

“Right now, we’d just be shooting fishes out of a barrel to deter-mine what it would be.”

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Th e only ready to go survey on the market was the conference board’s Sport Tourism Economic Assessment Model (STEAM), but it would collect diff er-ent data from that of an oil show.

“Th e organizing committee asked if we have some sort of framework that can like to use,” said Ducherer

“Th e ones we’ve done in the past and the framework that we’ve used in the past is spe-cifi c to sport tourism.”

Th e STEAM model used dur-ing the 2013 CCAA Women’sVolleyball National Champion-ship in Lloydminster is designed to calculate both the provincial and regional economic im-pacts of sport tourism.

“It doesn’t compare apples to apples, but this heavy oil show has a lot more corporate spending,” said Duch-erer.

“Typically, people spend corporate dollars a lot more freely than they do they own.

“For the com-prehensive study we wanted to do, it was go-ing to be about $10,000 which was signifi cantly high for what they were going to be to give us.

“I didn’t think it was a super good value this time because there was a comparison I wanted.”

Ducherer wants to compare apples to apples or oil shows to oil shows.

“It just wasn’t going to work out this time, but I was hoping we have a little more data on similar events and a little more cash as well to budget for,” she said.

“We will be pre-pared in 2016, and hopefully have some comparisons outside of the city and work with an organization like the Conference Board of Canada and really get down to the nitty gritty.”

Th e economic de-velopment corporation’s in-house survey at this year’s show will collect information from booth exhibitors on the num-ber of overnight stays, the average amount of money spent each day and if it’s personal or corporate money.

“We’ve got a pre-pared survey that we are going to go around and do,” said Ducherer

“Basically, it will be broken down to what you are spending money on – food and beverage, accommodation, enter-tainment – that sort of category.

“It’s not going to be super comprehensive like we wanted to do, but at least it will give us some idea, and then when we are preparing for 2016 we will have a little bit more of an idea.”

Th e promotional footage taken by BR fi lms will air on the cor-poration website and on their YouTube channel.

“We will put to-gether a cool little video for ourselves and orga-nizers of the heavy oil show,” said Ducherer.

“Th e video will also help get our awareness out there. We’re a rela-tively new organization. We’re just three years now, and we want to go out there and we want to promote Lloydmin-ster.

“We want to tell Lloydminster’s story, so we need fi rsthand accounts of what Lloydminster means to people.

“We will see who is willing to talk to us. It’s always a little bit diffi cult to get people to do surveys, but I think if we get a nice little sample size then it would be worth our while.”

Th e economic de-velopment corporation also plans to make its survey fi ndings public to provide everyone with a sense of the eco-nomic impact of the oil show on city businesses.

“It will be exciting. As long as people par-ticipate, we will be able to get that information,” said Ducherer.

“Th is will be a good test year for us in prepa-ration for 2016 when hopefully, we will able to do a more compre-hensive survey with an outside party.”

While the oil show fi lls up hotels and res-taurants for that week, the major long term im-pact of the event is felt by the oil and growing industry itself.

“We start talking largely about the kind of tourism related im-pacts – a lot of people

coming, spending mon-ey and visitor stays, and all that sort of stuff ,” said economic develop-ment John Andersen.

“But it’s not just a tourism impact. Th at might be a short term economic impact, but really the heavy oil show is a premiere go-to resource for the heavy oil industry.

“Th e best oppor-tunity for businesses, entrepreneurs is to get together to share infor-mation. It becomes a hub of innovation. And that’s really the long term impact of having the heavy oil show here.

“We continue to have a meeting place for this broader industry that exists outside of the city of Lloydmin-ster.”

Organizers from the Lloydminster Oil-fi eld Technical Society expect 5,500 to 7,000 people will attend the two day show includ-ing guests from other countries.

“It’s a lot of people coming together in the same place sharing information, talking, engaging developing networks – that kind of impact is long stand-ing,” said Andersen.

“Th at’s the kind of thing we do every second year. We have a meeting of the minds.

“Th at’s an oppor-tunity to have long sus-tained impact in terms of more opportunities for innovation within the industry, exchange of employees and em-ployee ideas. Th at’s the really big driver.”

Th e demand for hotel rooms by the oil and gas sector through-out the year and during oil show years has led to the opening of hun-dreds of new rooms this year with more to come.

“It’s great news for Lloydminster and great news for my job as economic develop-ment offi cer because in order to host events we need those rooms,” said Ducherer.

“With industry be-ing so strong in Lloyd-minster, thankfully, a lot of those rooms are fi lled all the time. Th e more rooms we have, the more chance we have of getting a big event in.

“A lot of these events we are work-ing on need 200 plus rooms.”


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Calgary – Questfi re Energy Corp. put its fi nancial house in order in the fi rst quarter while stoking the embers for growth including its heavy oil interests in the Lloydminster area.

Th e Calgary-based company plans to spend the remainder of its $20 million capital budget on light oil drilling at the Open Lake fi eld in West Central Alberta and heavy oil drill-ing in the Mannville, Auburndale and Wildmere fi eld southwest of Lloyd-minster.

Some money will also be spent on lower cost well and facility optimiza-

tion projects in Questfi re’s gas proper-ties.

“With three signifi cant corporate deals completed so far this year, stron-ger than expected natural gas prices and a growing inventory of drill-ready oil prospects, 2014 is shaping up to be a very exciting year for Questfi re,” said the company in a May 22 quarterly news release.

Th e three corporate fi nancing deals reduced their overall debt, simplifi ed their share structure and reduced the dilution risk to Class A shareholders.

Questfi re expects to exit 2014 with

a production rate of 5,500 barrels of oil equivalent per day with 28 per cent oil and natural gas liquids weighting.

In the fi rst quarter, the company reported an average production rate of 4,974 boepd with a 78 per cent weighting.

Th e company achieved record quarterly sales of $21 million and record funds fl ow from operations of $8.4 million thanks in part to average realized gas prices of $5.97 per mcf.

“Due to the cold winter weather experienced in much of North Amer-ica, natural gas storage inventories at the end of the fi rst quarter reached lows not seen since 2003, which is helping to support forward natural gas prices for the remainder of 2014 and beyond,” said the company.

Questfi re owns a one third work-ing interest in the heavy oil Auburn-dale fi eld with the potential to benefi t from up to 15 additional horizontal wells that could be drilled in the play.

During the fi rst quarter a one-third (ownership) Lloydminster forma-tion horizontal heavy oil well began producing at an approximate rate of 125 barrels per day dipping to 100 bpd by May 22.

All of Questfi re’s emerging heav-ing oil plays in East Central Alberta experienced successes in the fi rst quar-ter including a 100 per cent working interest stratigraphic test well in the Mannville fi eld.

Th at test well encountered heavy oil pay in the Sparky formation that has seen a lot of horizontal drilling activity adjacent to Questfi re’s land.

Questfi re has acquired a surface pad-site and is making preparations for drilling up to 16, 100 per cent working interest, conventional heavy oil hori-zontal wells.

Th e fi rst well was expected to be drilled in late May or early June with the results to come.

In the Wildmere fi eld, Questfi re shot 10.4 square kilometers of 3D seismic program targeting the Sparky formation. Th e results, described as highly encouraging, may lead to the drilling of up to 13 horizontal oil wells, with a 25 per cent working interest.

Th e company expects to install an artifi cial life this quarter on a 100 per cent working interest vertical 13-27 Ostracod light oil well, drilled in late 2013 in the Open Lake fi eld in West Central Alberta.

Th e lift is expected to the double the initial low draw down production rate of approximate 40 boepd with a 50 per cent light oil weighting.

During the fi rsts quarter, Questfi re continued preparations to drill three additional vertical locations in the cur-rent second quarter.

A further nine, 100 per cent work-ing interest light oil drilling locations have been identifi ed in the Open Lake fi eld.


Lloydminster – Husky Energy is equipping the new Energy Centre at the Lloydminster campus of Lake-land College with specialized heavy oil upgrading process simulator and software.

Th e system was donated by Husky, in partnership with Invensys and announced on July 10 in advance of the delivery of two more teach-ing boilers for the Energy Centre in mid-July.

Th e fi rst teaching boiler and a turbine to provide power for the campus were installed at the centre on June 10.

Husky has donated more than $2 million in cash and gifts-in-kind since 2011 including the simulator package through capital campaigns, student awards, curriculum development, and practicum placements and employ-ment.

“We know how vital hands-on experience is to learning,” said Husky CEO Asim Ghosh.

“Husky depends on skilled work-ers and is committed to developing skilled trades capacity in Canada.”

“Th is technology is phenom-enal for heavy oil training and we’re thrilled that Husky donated it to us for use in the new facility,” said Tracy

Edwards, president of Lakeland Col-lege

“Th is will help our students live the learning and develop skills that industry needs”

Husky and Lakeland College have also signed a contract extension that will see $360,000 donated over the next three years for power engi-neering scholarships.

As many as fi ve awards of $22,000 each will be given annually to second-year heavy oil power engineer-ing students to help with education-related costs.

In 2012, Husky donated $750,000 towards construction of the Energy Centre, plus $360,000 to start the scholarship program.

Construction of the Energy Cen-tre is nearing completion with a grand opening planned on Nov. 14.

Students who start the heavy oil operations technician and heavy oil power engineering programs this fall should have access to two 50-seat simulation labs, a common area and change rooms.

Equipment in the power lab, including a two-storey distillation tower and four boilers, will be com-missioned this fall and should be operational by 2015.

Husky backstops Energy Centre learning

Lakeland College steam lab instructor Greg Shalay gets to wear a hat numer-

taking delivery of new green coloured teaching boilers to be installed in the new Energy Centre at the Lloydminster campus. File photo


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Calgary – Inter Pipeline Ltd. expects to start shipping diluent north from its Lamont pump station to oil sands facilities at Foster Creek and Christina Lake shortly on a new 290 kilometre section of its Polaris pipe-line system.

The completed $1.4 billion system expansion will ship diluent used to thin bitumen in pipelines via a new 290-kilometre, 30-inch diam-eter mainline and associated pipeline laterals.

“This major expansion was completed on-schedule and with world-class safety performance dur-ing a period of heightened industry activity,” said Christian Bayle, Inter Pipeline’s chief executive in a July 18 announcement.

The commercial service status of the pipeline is already generating cash flow for Inter Pipeline under its 20 year diluent transportation agree-

ment with FCCL, a business venture between Cenovus Energy and Cono-coPhillips Canada Resources Corp.

FCCL has contracted for 350,000 barrels per day of firm ship-or-pay capacity on the new mainline, which will generate approximately $90 mil-lion in annual before tax cash flow for Inter Pipeline.

These shipping arrangements rep-resent approximately 50 per cent of the newly installed expansion capacity.

Inter Pipeline is aggressively pursuing opportunities to attract

additional third party shippers to the system.

The newly installed mainline and accompanying laterals account for approximately $1.1 billion of the estimated $1.4 billion total cost of the Polaris expansion.

The remaining segments of the Polaris expansion, including a dilu-ent connection to FCCL’s Narrows Lake oil sands facility are on schedule and are expected to be completed in phases between late 2014 and mid 2017.

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phase of it Polaris pipeline system expan-sion with a 290 kilometre pipeline that will soon begin to ship diluent from the

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Calgary – Osum Oil Sands Corp. has joined the ranks of producing companies in the Cold Lake oil sands play with its $325 million purchase of the Orion property from Royal Dutch Shell PLC.

The deal announced June 10 is expected to close July31 with Osum have a 100 per cent working interest as the sole operator.

“The Orion project is a first class operation that will provide Osum with significant current production and cash flow,” said Osum’s chief executive Steve Spence in a statement.

“Our immediate fo-cus is on ensuring a safe and smooth transition of operations. “

“In the longer term we believe that by link-ing Orion together with our nearby Taiga proj-ect, Osum has a unique opportunity to build a significant produc-tion platform in the

Cold Lake region,” said Spence.

Orion has been operating since 2007 and produced 6,700 barrels of bitumen a day from steam assisted gravity drainage or SAGD in the first quarter from 22 well pairs.

At forecast pro-duction rates, Orion is expected to have an economic life of 25 years.

The Orion site is about 18 kilometres southwest of the Taiga SAGD project that has received regulatory ap-proval to construct and operate 35,000 barrels of bitumen a day.

The Taiga project has been assigned 359 million barrels of proved plus probable reserves.

The acquisition is expected to delay this fall’s construction start on the first 12,500 bpd phase of Taiga while the integration of Orion is in progress.

The purchase of Orion will be largely

funded by Barclays Bank PLC and Goldman Sachs Lending Partners LLC for US $225 mil-lion with the balance in cash plus investments from existing share-holders in the privately owned company.

Osum buys Cold Lake producer


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Lloydminster – B.W. Rig Supply in Lloydminster may have to add a special large order of hotdog buns and condiments to its inventory of components and consumables for the service and drilling rig industry.

Th e retail outlet is planning to celebrate its 26th year of business in Lloy-dminster with a fall barbecue for its many customers that store manager Cory Bourassa attributes to growing the business over the years.

Th at means there will likely be enough celebration day food on hand for second helpings.

“We are lucky enough to serve some of the best customers in this industry, hard working, great guys to deal with on a daily basis,” said Bourassa.

“Th ey’re the greatest and they know who to go to for the specialty parts.”B.W. Rig Supply is best known as a one stop rig-up store for the service rig

market and for fl ushby, coil tubing and water truck operations.It’s also the place to go for wire rope rigging supplies.

“We sell equipment that nobody else does in Lloyd,” said Bourassa.“We carry everything from toilet paper, microwaves and fridges to blowout

preventers, tubing tongs and drill line cable.”B.W. Rig Supply is the exclusive Canadian distributor of Westco Products

International and their complete line of handling equipment, tubing tongs, rod tongs, elevators and related products.

Th e store is also one of two distributors in Canada of supplies from U.S.-based Integrated Equipment.

“Th ey have a full line of blowout preventers, annulars and rubber products,” said Bourassa.

“Trico Rod Handling Equipment is another huge supplier for us. “Th ey are suppliers of the complete line of Trico handling equipment such

as rod elevators, rod hooks, and rod spinners and that sort of thing.”Th e Lloydminster B.W. Rig Supply store is part of a three store chain with

other outlets in Nisku and Red Deer owned and operated as one of six com-pany divisions of Hyduke Energy Services Corp. Page A31

equipment including this popular tubing tong being promoted by Lloydminster store manager Cory Bourassa.

B.W. Rig Supply celebrating 26th year


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Hyduke acquired B.W. Rig Sup-ply about 15 years ago from its local founder Ben Wentworth who gave the business its name.

Th e Lloyd shop has expanded three times in its history and is currently operating from a 10,000 sq. ft. shop in the Glenn E. Nielson Industrial Park.

It’s become known as Lloy-dminster’s largest supplier to the service rig and drilling industry with a growing customer base in oil hot spots such as Bonnyville, Swift Cur-rent, Weyburn and Estevan and parts of Manitoba.

Parts and supplies are shipped from the Lloydminster as far away as Ontario and Australia.

“I ship to Australia almost every day,” said Bourassa.

B.W. Rig Supply in Lloydmin-ster carries more over $1 million worth of inventory.

“We maintain one of the largest inventories of well service equipment which allows us to sell everything for a complete rig-up package,” said Bourassa.

Th e store also stocks a good selection of safety gear such as har-nesses and they rent fall arrest and weight indication equipment.

Th ere are thousands of well service parts and general supplies in stock for immediate pickup or delivery.

“Most of my competition is in

Edmonton or Nisku, so with me carrying this kind of inventory it stops people from calling them,” said Bourassa.

“I want to make sure this store becomes the best set up store in the patch. Nobody has to go to Edmon-ton.

“Customers know they can buy it in Lloyd and they know they can get it the same day. Th at’s how I try to set up and maintain this store.”

Chances are many customers know exactly what’s in stock since Bourassa encourages customers to walk in to the stock room and fi ll a cart with what they need almost as if they were grocery shopping.

It’s the way the business was originally run as a customer-friendly store and what helps to make it stand out from the competition today.

“We allow customers to go in the back and walk through our shelves and pick out what they need,” said Bourassa.

“We encourage that. Th ey see all our new items that we bring in and it’s a little easier for them and better for us.”

B.W. Rig Supply has also set aside a room for customers to pick up their day orders after hours.

“Th ey will ask us to set it out in the pickup room at night so we know who we talked to, and then we give them the combination. We change the combo every night,” explained Bourassa.

“Th e customers really love that.

Th ey can come in at 3 a.m. and pick up their items if they get into town at that time. Th ey are not calling us to get their product out “

B.W. Rig Supply has a delivery truck and six employees including three people on the order desk and two shipper/receivers.

“Our employees have been well trained. Th ey’ve been long-term employees. Some have been here for eight years and some for a couple of years,” said Bourassa, who has been minding the store for 15 years.

“Since I’ve been here business has been pretty steady. Th e heavy oil industry in this whole area has kept

us busy.”As the store manager, Bourassa

spends a lot of time on the road talk-ing with customers.

“Th e customer base keeps grow-ing. Th at’s a big part of my job is to make sure we grow that. A lot of it is going to see guys, making sure you’re seen,” said Bourassa.

“Th e Weyburn and Estevan is another area where we have attracted many new dedicated customers that we are serving out of this store.

“It’s a pretty good area for us.”No doubt customers from that

area will be invited to the 26th anni-versary bash to be announced.


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Lloydminster – Fillmore Construction led a media hard hat tour of the construction progress the company is making inside the new $23 million Energy Centre at Lakeland College in Lloydminster on July 17.

Th e tour was timed for the arrival and preliminary installa-tion of the two more new teaching boilers for the centre with a fi nal

fi retube boiler to come in August.

Th e new arrivals were a D-type and an O-type boiler made by Victory Energy in the United States and fol-lowed the installation of a once-through boiler and a turbine on June 11.

Once again, Prairie Crane was on hand to lift the pair of boilers into a bay door at the new facility.

“It is an exciting day. As every piece of equipment goes into the building we are one step closer to our opening and having our students in here,” said Kara Johnston, dean of energy programming.

“Th at’s pretty excit-ing for us when it comes to our industry training and what we promised industry and what we promised students.”

Lakeland will of-

fi cially open the new centre on Nov. 14 with the fi rst student usage of the lab expected to begin in January.

“We are hoping to be in early in 2015 if ev-erything goes well,” said Robert Jago Lakeland’s energy chair.

“Th ere is still a lot of piping and construc-tion to do. Th e building is almost complete on the construction side, but it takes a little while to commission all the equipment to make sure it’s running properly.

“At the same time, we want to make sure it’s running safely be-fore we put any students in.”

Fillmore Construc-tion site supervisor Brad Brenneis told the media everything is on schedule for an early October completion of the building.

“It’s really inter-esting and exciting to see all the boilers and everything come in. When it gets piped in, it’s going to change re-

ally fast,” said Brenneis inside the cavernous

space for the lab. Page A33

Energy Centre hosts media tour on boiler day

of the new Energy Centre at Lakeland College in Lloyd-minster with the delivery of two more teaching boil-ers. Crews from Prairie Crane hoisted the pieces into an opening inside the new lab.


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Page A32Concrete pads were

previously poured to provide a bed for each of the boilers and the turbine.

Th e equipment is pulled into place with aid of rollers, blocks and a forklift truck.

“Th e boilers will be integrated right into the college system so they are not just going to be sitting there blowing steam through the roof,” explained steam instruc-tor Greg Shalay.

“Th e steam will go through the turbine to generate electricity and heat for the college. It will generate all of the heat, but not all of the electricity for the campus.

“It will take quite awhile to hook it up. It requires connecting pipes between boilers, turbines, heat exchang-ers, de-aerators and the pumps and everything.”

Th e site tour and delivery of the latest boilers follows on the heels of a donation by Husky Energy in part-nership with Invensys of specialized heavy oil upgrading process simulator and software for the lab.

“We’ve always been very grateful at Lake-land College for the support that you get in industry from Husky and from all the other industry partners,” said Jago.

“All the gracious

donations go to im-prove the quality of the academic program here at Lakeland College. It will defi nitely improve the quality of training that our students get.”

A fractionation or distillation tower being stored at the Vermilion campus will be the fi nal big piece of heavy oil teaching equipment to be installed.

“It’s still in the box. We haven’t unwrapped it. It’s not Christmas-time yet,” said Shalay.

“It’s one of the things we bought to extend the experiences of the students. It will take a mixture of fl uids and use low pressure steam and ‘distill off ’ the diff erent factions in the fl uid and separate them.”

Th e tower was made in France out of glass to allow students to watch the distillation processes used in heavy oil refi n-ing.

Th e Energy Centre plans and the lifting of the boilers drew cheers from the fi nal class of summer steam program students in 2014, and by new instructor Kevin Ma who started work the day before the tour.

“Kevin joins us from Medicine Hat. He brings a great of experi-ence in operations as well,” said Jago.

“He’s got 25 years in industry and he’s been teaching for fi ve years.

“He walked in the

door early yesterday morning , so he’s hit the ground running. We had him in a class yesterday afternoon.”

Ma’s hiring is well timed for the fi rst intake of what will be a record number of 140 energy students for the fall term.

“We have lots of new faculty here and everyone’s pretty excited about the future of power engineering at Lakeland College,” said Johnston.

Th e fi rst intake of students will take place on Aug.6 in the existing lab and classrooms with the second intake on Aug. 11 and so on.

“By the end of August we will have 104 students in the building. Our last 36 will come in September,” said Johnston.

Th e total enrolment will make Lakeland the second largest trainer

of power engineering in Alberta to NAIT based on enrolment numbers.

Despite the ongoing construction, Johnston said there will be no chaos thanks to the staggered start to classes and advanced planning.

“Our faculty and staff have worked so

hard to be organized for our students this fall,” she said.

“Our ducks are in a row. Everybody knows their role and we are ready to move forward.

“We’ve been mov-ing in this direction for the last two to three years and now after see-

ing all that hard work come to fruition it’s just really phenomenal for us.”

Th is fall there will be two fi rst year heavy oil power engineering classes (HOPE) a heavy oil operations class a second year HOPE class.


Carnduff – Some Saskatchewan Roughriders went home, back to their homes in the States, during the bye week in mid-July. Carlos Thomas went to Carnduff.

He stopped by the Fast Trucking office with another player who wished to remain nameless. Later, Pipeline News ran into them, plus Woodny

Turenne, at a local diner in Carnduff.“I’m still playing. I was with Fast

the last off-season. Me and Woodny were the first,” Thomas said.

He came down to visit because he loved Carnduff.

Thomas is from Atlanta, Geor-gia. He did a brief stint of drilling rig work before signing on as a swamper

with Fast Trucking from December to January.

Thomas worked with Ricky Taylor as his driver, saying, “He was a good driver.”

“I’ll be back. That’s guaranteed,” he said. “There are better opportunities up here, better people here. It’s comfort-able here. I’m so used to the big city, it’s good to get away from the big city.”

Thomas and his wife stayed with Ryan Nichols, the principal of the Carnduff Education Complex. He had a shiny new Grey Cup championship

ring that he was going to show Nichols that day.

The defensive back is in his third year with the Riders. He was here in 2009, part of 2010, 2013 and 2014.

Thomas and his wife have their first kid on the way, due in November, a fact he’s very proud of.

“After we play the Grey Cup, I’ll be back,” he said, joking that maybe Fast Trucking general manager Dennis Day can pick him up from Vancouver (where the game will take place) in his helicopter.


Carlos Thomas plans to go swamping again this off-season


Estevan – Oxbow-based Saskarc is well-known for its large scale fabrication services, pro-viding mammoth pieces for everything from Fort McMurray oil-sands to potash mines and the Boundary Dam Carbon Capture Proj-ect. However, its lesser-known side is decidedly smaller in scale, offering numerous lines of rental equipment throughout Western Canada.

At the Estevan Energy Expo they had five of those products on display – a flameless heater, a super mainte-nance platform, portable stairs, a fuel tank known as a “Transcube,” and a water pump. They also carry light towers and generator sets. Air compressors are a recent addition to their large inventory fleet.

Dan Debreuil and Barry Cavenaugh spoke to Pipeline News about the Saskarc Equipment Group. Cavenaugh works out of Oxbow, while Debreuil works out of Winnipeg.

The rentals came

about in late 2011, with Cavenaugh joining shortly after that.

“We’re an equip-ment sales company that has a large rental fleet,” he said. About half of their business is sales, the other half is rentals.

Business has grown to the point where they are establishing a new shop in Edmonton which will have a dedi-cated service technician. Otherwise, they use a fleet of sub-contractors for servicing.

While Oxbow is home base, with over half of their business in northern Alberta and British Columbia, a closer shop was needed.

The coverage area is all over Manitoba, Sas-katchewan and Alberta, as well as northern Brit-ish Columbia.

Some of their clients are based in northern British Co-lumbia. While working in southeast Saskatch-ewan a few years ago they built a relationship with Saskarc, and that relationship has contin-

ued to this day. Asked how an

Oxbow company came to be working so far afield, Debreuil said, “It happens from relations. They buy something from us based on a need.”

He pointed out that staff like Cavenaugh are very dedicated. “They will get on a plane and service their clients.”

Debreuil added, “Some of our equip-ment is very special-ized.”

For instance, their heater packages have an endurance of 18 to 20 hours, not eight to 10, like some models. They have the capability of three 12-inch outlets or one 20-inch outlet, whereas other units in the field have two 12-inch outlets.

“We source very good products our cli-ents want,” he said.

For air compressors, they carry 185 and 375 cfm units, but Cav-enaugh added, “We do up to 1,170 cfm.”

They were brought on due to customer de-

mand. Cavenaugh noted the pipeline industry commonly uses units of these sizes. “It’s our big-gest industry by a long shot,” he said.

“Last winter we had over half a mil-lion dollars of equip-ment in Norman Wells, Northwest Territories,” Cavenaugh said.

Debreuil said it was ironic that they work all over Western Canada,

but don’t have a lot of market share around home. That was one of their motivations in attending the Estevan Energy Expo.

Other products Saskarc offers include light towers. They are primarily used in the winter time since the days are longer in the summer. “Safety is a big thing. It’s either lit up like a Christmas tree, or

you don’t work,” De-breuil said.

The made-in-Europe Transcube is approved for transpor-tation and on-site stor-age of fuel. It has four lifting points as well as forklift pockets. Since it is double-walled, it has its own 110 per cent secondary containment built in. Saskarc has them in sizes from 500 litres to 18,500 litres.

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Calgary – Crescent Point Energy Corp. has bolstered its Viking position with a $334 million purchase of oil assets from Polar Star Canadian Oil and Gas Inc., a private western Canadian oil and gas producer.

Th e acquired assets announced on June 12 include all of Polar Star’s assets in the Viking play at Dodsland, Saskatchewan.

Th e acquired assets consolidate Crescent Point’s existing Viking land position in the Dod-sland area and include more than 2,800 barrels of oil equivalent per day of high-quality, high-netback production.

Th e deal was made with $2 million in cash and 7.6 million shares a $43.88 per share in a mid-May

price agreement.Th e Viking acquisition increases Crescent

Point’s land position at Dodsland by 38 per cent to approximately 145 net sections.

Th e new assets include 258 net internally iden-tifi ed drilling locations, which increase Crescent Point’s low-risk, high rate-of-return drilling inven-tory in the Viking play at Dodsland by 70 per cent.

Crescent Point expects the assets to generate annualized free cash fl ow of approximately $52 million with forecast cash fl ow from the acquired assets of $87 million and estimated annual mainte-nance capital of $35 million,

“Th e Saskatchewan Viking play has very high netbacks of more than $85 per barrel,” said Scott

Saxberg, Crescent Point’s chief executive offi cer in a statement.

“We expect these assets to provide free cash fl ow that will help us reduce our 2015 all-in payout ratio by another two per cent.”

With the acquisition, Crescent Point is also boosting its 2014 guidance for production and funds fl ow from operations.

Th e company’s average daily production in 2014 is expected to increase to 135,500 boepd from 134,000 boepd and its 2014 exit production rate is expected to increase to 148,000 boepd from 145,000 boepd.

Crescent Point’s funds fl ow from operations is expected to increase to $2.45 billion from $2.4 billion.

Th e company’s capital expenditures budget for the year has also increased by $25 million to $1.8 billion.

Of the increase, Crescent Point expects to spend $15 million on drilling and completions and $10 million on land and facilities across the com-pany’s asset base.

Crescent Points pays $334 M on Viking play

Carmangay AB – Th e 300 megawatt Black-spring Ridge wind power project near Carmangay, Alta. will help Enbridge Inc. to meet its commit-ment to becoming a carbon neutral company.

Th e new $600 million Blackspring Ridge project is a partnership between EDF EN Canada Inc., a subsidiary of EDF Energies Nouvelles, and Enbridge.

Th e project is touted as the largest investment in wind energy to date in Western Canada.

EDF EN Canada and Enbridge offi cials joined Alberta Energy Minister Diana McQueen, Derrick Annable, Reeve of Vulcan County, Kym Nichols, Mayor of Carmangay, and more than 100 other guests to dedicate the project in Carmangay on July 15.

Page A37

Enbridge goes big in wind


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Enbridge applauds 300 MW wind farm Page A36

“Th e successful completion of Blackspring Ridge is the result of strong support by the local communities, municipality and provincial government, along with outstanding teamwork by Enbridge, EDF EN Canada and our partners,” said Enbridge chief fi nancial offi cer Richard Bird.

“Enbridge has been investing in Alberta’s energy infrastructure for over 60 years, and we’re proud to continue building strong relationships and expanding Alberta’s renewable power supply through this investment.”

Th e company is committed to generating a kilowatt of renewable energy for every addition kilowatt of conventional electricity its company’s operations consume.

Enbridge owns over 1,350 MW of net capacity in renewable and alterna-tive energy and is the largest solar energy generator and the second largest wind power generator in Canada.

Construction of the 166 turbine Blackspring Ridge project commenced in May 2013 and reached commercial operation in this May. Mortenson Canada served as the construction contractor.

Electric power is generated by the latest generation of Vestas V100-1.8 MW turbines.

Blackspring Ridge generates enough clean energy to meet the electricity needs of about 140,000 Albertan homes.

“Th e Blackspring Ridge project is a joint eff ort between industry and gov-ernment that demonstrates Alberta’s commitment to renewable energy devel-opment,” said Alberta Energy Minister Diana McQueen.

“Th e Government of Alberta is proud to support state-of-the-art projects, like Blackspring Ridge, as we work together to green the grid in Alberta.”

Th e project created 350 jobs during the construction phase and another 20 full time operations and maintenance jobs.

“Th e indirect benefi ts to the area from these jobs is also a major contribu-tor to our local economy,” said Vulcan County Reeve Derrick Annable.

Th e project was funded by Enbridge, EDF EN Canada, and Vestas along with a $10 million from the Alberta-based Climate Change and Emissions Management Corporation.

Th e CCEMC provides funding for projects that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and help Alberta adapt to climate change.

Since October 2012, EDF EN Canada and Enbridge have commissioned three jointly-owned wind projects in Quebec: with a combined output of 530

MW.By the end of 2015, EDF EN Canada will have placed into service 1,374

MW of wind and solar in Canada and created employment opportunities for over 1,000 people in the development and construction phase.

Enbridge and its partners dedicated the new 300 MW Blackspring Ridge wind power project in Carmangay Alberta south of Vulcan on July 15. The $600 million

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Estevan – You’ve probably seen their work in recent STC television commer-cials, with aerial video taken of a bus along the Qu’Appelle valley. You will also see their work if you watch the upcoming Corner Gas movie. But now Java Post Productions of Regina is looking at a diff erent kind of gas for business, i.e. oil and gas.

Java Post Produc-tions was one of the exhibitors at the inau-gural Estevan Energy Expo June 11-13.

“We are a full service video production company,” said Doug Russell, who looks after business development. “Aerial photography is just one thing that we

do.”Recent televi-

sion commercials for SaskPower were also shot with their hexcop-ter unmanned aerial vehicle, or drone. It’s a heavily customized DJI Innovations machine, with six rotors and a high-end stabilization gimbal for silky-smooth video work.

(Th e company has a similar hand-held rig for work on the ground.)

All in, the drone, nicknamed the “Java-copter,” costs around $25,000. Th ey only have one right now, but are in the process of acquir-ing a second, more pow-erful unit. Th at would relegate the Javacopter to secondary usage.

Th e elimination of the Saskatchewan fi lm tax credit has been devastating to the mo-tion picture business in Saskatchewan.

“It made it chal-lenging,” Russell said. “It’s changed the busi-ness model. Many of our usual customers for fi lm and television have left the province. We’re pursuing other

areas. We’re looking to introduce ourselves to companies in oil and gas.”

Mining and forestry are other targets.

“We’ve always done commercial work, i.e. advertising,” he said. “We’ve always done corporate work. We hope to do more. Aerial is just another service we can bring to the table. We’re here to in-troduce ourselves to the players in the southern Saskatchewan oil and gas industry.

Th e Regina-based company has been around for more than 20 years, and has ap-proximately 12 people on staff .

One of their ser-vices on display was geo-referenced ortho-graphic photography. By fl ying a pattern over a site and taking multiple pictures, a 3D map is created. Th e map is almost indistinguish-able from normal video shot from the drone. Th is service is useful in environmental mapping, watersheds, and decom-missioning of old wells, Russell noted.

Drone can create 3D graphics of leasesThis drone, a six-rotor remote-controlled helicopter, can shoot pictures that can then be turned into a highly accurate 3D graphic. It is typically used for aerial video work. Photo by Brian Zinchuk


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By Brian ZinchukLampman – Standing in a fi eld of wheat wav-

ing gently in the wind, one fi nds two surveyors in mosquitoes so thick, three fl y into your mouth as you try to have a 10 minute conversation.

Give blood, go into surveying.Mike Clausen, a surveyor with 22 years under

his belt, is tromping through this mosquito-ridden wheat with Riley Wallewein, his helper, who has two months under his belt.

Wallewein is a summer student who is tak-ing geomatics in surveying at Moose Jaw’s Palliser Campus at SIAST.

Th ey’re working on a lease northeast of Lamp-man, north of the former townsite of Browning. It’s a 165 by 120 metre lease. Two wells are planned now, and as many as fi ve more subsequent wells may be drilled from the pad.

Th e wheat may have made it to three-and-a-half feet tall, but everything within the boundaries they marked was expected to be cleared in the com-ing weeks in preparation for drilling.

As Clausen marked the boundary points with his GPS device, mounted on a tall pole he carried, Wallewein would follow up by pounding in a pink lath. A second one was then affi xed to the fi rst to

make if visible above the wheat. Asked how much time separates their survey

work to the commencement of drilling operations, Clausen said, “Sometimes a week, sometimes a day, sometimes, a couple of months.”

It was 24 C, with a light breeze, which made it a nice day. With heavy rains a few weeks before, Clausen said there had been lots of mud, too much mud, but this site was nice.

“It’s a good thing we’re not out east,” he said.A two-well pad might take a day, or two days,

depending on the survey evidence. Th at’s the pins placed by surveyors going back well over 100 years.

“We fi nd a couple of legal pins and work off that. Two for sure. Sometimes you need eight. We calculate in where they want to drill,” said Clausen.

Th is time the pins were easy to fi nd. Clausen uses the metal detector to fi nd them, and Walle-wein gets them up. In this area, many of the pins have been identifi ed recently, so it’s not too hard. Quite often in new drill areas they have to reset pins, going off 1920 plans, sometimes older.

Once pins are located, that information is put into the data collector, part of the satellite-based navigation and survey system.

A base station is set up. It looks like a large

mushroom on top of a tripod, often found along the side of a road. Th e rover, the GPS receiver on a rod, is used to reference where the pins are. Th e rover and base station communicate to each other wirelessly.

With the base station in place, it’s time to start walking. “I did the two well centres fi rst, then I usually walk clockwise around, putting up sticks,” Clausen said. “Th en I’ll do the road on the way out, the two boundaries.”

A stake convention defi nes the colours of the stakes. Red is power, orange is telephone, blue is water, yellow is gas, oil and emulsion, pink is boundaries. Green would be sanitary sewer in mu-nicipal applications, but since there is new sanitary sewer in the oilpatch, this particular client uses green to defi ne extra workspace.

Access roads are usually straight, but they can be crooked if they have to go around items like sloughs.

“For today, we’re also doing a fl owline right-of-way to the battery site” said Clausen.

“For today, (the client) just wants the survey where the pipe bends, and then he’ll get the envi-ronmentalist to take a look at it.”

Page B2

Give blood, go into surveying

NEWSPIPELINE SECTION B

August 2014

Walking through wheat is not so bad. Canola, on the other hand, is another story. Midwest Surveys crew chief Mike Clausen tromps through wheat northeast of Lampman. Photo by Brian Zinchuk

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Page B1Th e spakes are go-

ing on the defl ections of the right-of-way.

“Th is is your basic oilfi eld stuff ,” Clausen said. Th e pair usually works in the Oungre area.

Asked what makes their job easier or harder, Clausen said, “Th e weather makes it harder. If you’re in a new area where there’s no survey control, no pins,

(makes it harder).“Wintertime with

four feet, fi ve feet of snow and 40 below, and summertime, when it gets to 35, 40 degrees. I’m a summer guy. Some like it cold.

“Wind, anytime of year, is not much fun.

“Windchill and stormy conditions are the determining fac-tors when deciding to go out in the winter.” Clausen said, “Cold in

the winter isn’t bad if it’s not windy.”

As for how he got into it, Clausen said a friend needed a helper, and that’s how he got his in. He started as a rodman.

“We still had the chain and EDM (elec-tronic distance measure-ment) back then,” he said

It used infrared to determine distance.

In a couple of years

Clausen was a crew chief. When he started, Midwest only had two, and then three crews in the area. It’s grown considerably since then. He’s only worked for Midwest as a surveyor.

He grew up in Beaubier, near Lake Alma.

As for how long he will work in the fi eld, Clausen said, “I’ll see how long the body holds out. Maybe another 15 years. We do a lot of walking.”

One surveyor with them has been doing it for about 30 years.

Another is in his 50s.When not walk-

ing in a fi eld, Clausen is walking on the golf course.

Wallewein found out about surveying at a career fair in school. “It was one of those presen-tations where I thought, ‘Th at would be cool to go to,’ and I’m sure glad I did,” he said.

He just fi nished his fi rst year of schooling and has one more year to go. Asked what his plans are, Wallewein said, “I’d like to hopeful-ly come back here. Th is is home for me. If that

works for the company, I would love to come back.”

He farms north of Benson. “It’s a fam-ily farm. Not very big, just 20 quarters of land, compared to the 150 and 200 quarter guys.

“Being outside, I like being on the land. Finding all those boundary pins are in-teresting, being how old they are.”

Wallewein fi nds having a farming back-ground is helpful. “Yeah, especially knowing where you are,” he said, pointing and laughing, “Th ere’s north!

“I’m sure there’s a lot of people you bring out here, and they don’t even know where north is.

“You learn every day. I’ve learned so much since working here. I thought I knew quite a bit about how land was divided. I’ve learned a lot just work-ing here two months.”

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B3PIPELINE NEWS August 2014

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By Brian Zinchuk

Estevan – If there was any question who is the most active driller in Saskatchewan, we saw that answered in mid-July. Rig Locator (www.riglocator.ca) records on July 21 showed that Crescent Point Energy Corp. was the most active company in all of Canada, with 25 rigs working, two more than second place Cana-dian Natural Resources. Progress Energy Canada Ltd. had 22 rigs and Husky Energy Inc. and Tourmaline Oil Corp. each had 18.

But drilling down those numbers, as it were, found that all but one of Crescent Point’s rigs were working in Saskatchewan. Th at accounted for 24 of 85 active rigs, or 28.2 per cent of active Saskatch-ewan rigs. Husky had 13 of its 18 rigs working in Saskatchewan, mostly centred in the region east of Lloydminster.

Drilling companies used by Crescent Point and the number of rigs

employed (in paren-thesis) were as follows: Alliance Drilling (3), Bonanza Drilling (1, near Provost, Alta.), CanElson Drilling (6), Crusader Drilling (1), Ensign Drilling (1), Horizon Drilling (2), Precision Drilling (7), Red Dog Drilling

(1), Savanna Drilling Canada (3).

As for areas of drill-ing, the Viewfi eld area near Stoughton saw nine rigs, Shaunavon had seven, with an additional rig at Pen-nant. One rig was near Oxbow and another was just south of Weyburn.

Five were drilling right along the U.S. border between Torquay and Oungre. Th is coincides with Crescent Point’s stated plans to dramati-cally expand its op-erations in the Torquay play in the coming

years. Th e Torquay is

known as the Th ree Forks formation in North Dakota, and the most active drillers in that state are now planning more wells for the Th ree Forks than

the Bakken in their long term development plans, as outlined at the Williston Basin Pe-troleum Conference in May this past year.

Rig Locator is a sister publication of Pipeline News.

This map from Rig Locator (www.riglocator.ca) as of July 21 saw 24 rigs working for Crescent Point Energy Corp. That accounted for over one quarter

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By Brian ZinchukEstevan – Th ere

was no problem fi nding a parking spot during the fi rst day of Do-All Industries Ltd. receiver-ship auction which took place June 25-26 in Estevan. However, that changed substantially on the second day.

Th e auction was conducted in person and online. Maynards conducted the sale in conjunction with Bi-ditup, Myron Bowling Auctioneers and Infi nity Asset Solutions.

Maynards and its partners bought all the assets that were put up by the receiver, and held a receivership sale, according to accord-ing to Mike McIntosh, executive vice president of the industrial division of Maynards, who was present at the auction.

“We bought the assets from the receiver, that’s it.”

Th e high point of the auction or low point, depending on one’s

perspective, was the off ering of seven parcels of real estate.

“None of the real estate sold,” McIntosh said.

Th e seven parcels were fi rst off ered all together, including a hanger at Estevan Airport big enough for a twin-engine turboprop airplane. Th ere were no bids. Th en they of-fered the new shop and sandblasting/paint shop parcels together. No bids there, either. Parcels were then put up for bid individually.

Parcel 2, the sand-blasting and paint shop and the land around it, was the only piece to see any bidding. Th e initial opening bid asked was $5 million, but no one came forward, so the auctioneer dropped to $3.5 million before slowly coming back up to $4.7 million, which was where bidding ended. However, that bid fell through. Mc-Intosh explained, “He didn’t have the fi nancing in place. It was not a good bid.”

Parcel 1, the new shop and offi ce and

surrounding land, saw the auctioneer ask for $5 million. Again, there were no bids, and it did not sell.

Th e 6th Street properties then were off ered collectively for $4 million, and received no bids. Th ey were then broken up into individ-ual pieces at $1 million a pop, but still there were no takers.

Th e hanger, with a 13 year lease, also re-ceived no bids. Th e auc-tioneer asked $400,000.

Several people left after the real estate por-tion was done.

On the morning of the fi rst day, many of the lots were small, includ-ing various tools and pickup truck tool boxes. Several people told us prices were going high. Th e afternoon saw rig-related equipment like Kelly bushings, swivels and the like.

Senior management from most of the small local drilling contrac-tors were present. Mike “Cannon” Smith of CanElson Drilling said, “We’re all here for the same thing, pipe tubs and racks. Page B5

Do-All Industries assets go on the auction block

Colin and Kelsey Fedoruk both used to work for Do-All Industries. Now they have their


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Page B4He was also look-

ing at boilers, but didn’t think there was as much interest from the others.

Do-All built many or all of the rigs those contractors run. How-ever, two of those senior managers have told Pipeline News in recent months that it would make more sense to buy out a competitor then build new rigs, adding to the rig fl eet. Smith said there is “a little bit of market saturation.”

One person had told Pipeline News they had considered buying Do-All lock stock and barrel and continuing to operate it as a rig manu-facturing company. Th at idea appears to have fallen through.

Th e second day of the auction saw heavy equipment like loaders and forklifts come up for bid.

Asked how many bidders they had, McIn-tosh said, “I think there was probably, online and in the room, 400 in total,” McIntosh said.

Th ere were about 1400-1500 lots, he said.

As for the unsold land, he said, “We keep marketing it like we have for the last month.

We have a real estate agent.”

Maynards and its partners had eight people on site for the auction.

Asked about the diff erence in attendance for the two days, he said, “Look at the diff erence of what we were sell-ing. We were selling real estate, with limited amount of buyers, and we were selling inven-tory. Today, we had twice as many people. Why? We were selling all the rolling stock and big fabrication equip-ment – a totally diff er-ent crowd.”

“We were pleased with the sale results,” McIntosh concluded.

Th e Feb. 6 notice of statement of the receiver said that Do All Indus-tries had $30.9 million in secured creditors, $288,000 in preferred creditors, and $8.2 million in unsecured creditors. Th eir property, plant and equipment was listed at $25 mil-lion, among assets listed with a total book value of $50.4 million as of Jan. 31, 2014.

Th e fi fth report from the receiver, Al-verez & Marsal Can-ada, Inc., dated May 7

indicated “Th e receiver received 21 separate off ers, some of which were for individual or multiple parcels and one enbloc off er.”

Th e report said, “Th rough its advertising, discussions with former management of the Do- All Group, independent research searching Ca-nadian and U.S. energy industry association da-tabases and other such sources, the receiver contacted over 120 par-ties in Canada and the US, including competi-tors, energy companies, auction companies and real estate brokers.”

“Th e receiver has accepted and the Court has approval one off er which included all of the Nisku property, in-cluding but not limited to real estate, equipment and inventory,” the re-port stated. Th e sale was expected to close May 9.

Th e amount May-nards paid for the block of Estevan assets was sealed by the court, and McIntosh would not say how much they paid. Th e report did say, “Estevan en bloc off er is the highest and best off er received ensures a reasonable recovery for the estates of the Do-All Group.”

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By Brian ZinchukEstevan – A little over a week after a major rain

event at the end of June caused widespread flooding in southeast Saskatchewan and southwest Mani-toba, thing slowly started to return to normal.

Normal, that is, if you consider the month of July to be one where the oil industry is brought to a crawl by wet conditions, as has happened several times in recent years. The most notable example of weather-affected activity was in 2011, when numer-ous rural municipalities in southeast Saskatchewan found they had to cut roads to release floodwaters and restrict weights to prevent damage. That hap-pened again in 2014.

The Rig Locator map of July 8 told the tale – a wide swath of red dots indicating down rigs throughout the region.

The busy area right along the U.S. border, where the Torquay formation is gaining prominence, got away relatively unscathed by the rain, and thus was working. This area, south of Highway 18 in Sas-katchewan, had 11 active drilling rigs. But north of Highway 18, it was an entirely different story. There were just six rigs working north of that line, with none in the normally busy Stoughton area. The closest rig to Stoughton was in the Browning area, south of Arcola, drilling for T. Bird Oil.

Manitoba was just as bad, with one of 19 rigs

active. That rig was drilling in Tundra Oil and Gas’s Sinclair field, which had been plagued with numer-ous highway closures in all directions.

Other parts of the province fared better. Of the 40 rigs in the southwest corner, including the Shaunavon and Kindersley areas, 20 of 40 rigs were active. Nine were working in a cluster around Kerrobert and Kindersley. A couple were along the Alberta border and another was working between Elrose and Kyle. The north-south Shaunavon trend accounted for most of the rest.

In northwest Saskatchewan, in the Lloydmin-ster area, activity was scattered throughout, with several rigs working near Maidstone and Edam. Fourteen of 29 rigs were active.

These numbers were reflected in the activity level of the rig movers. Fast Trucking Service Ltd. of Carnduff and its sister company Sam’s Trucking of Estevan handle the vast majority of rig moves in southeast Saskatchewan. On July 4, five days after the heavy rains, Greg Wall, co-ordinator with Fast, said they would be typically moving five to seven rigs in a day in early July. They had moved one that day.

“Had there been work, we would have been in trouble,” he said. “A lot of our people were dis-placed.”

Carnduff not only had to deal with flooding in its own backyard, but assisted both Gainsborough and Carievale with their evacuations. Gainsborough for a while had become an island, with all road ac-cess cut off by floodwaters.

Wall himself had just been getting back to work after spending several days working with the local emergency measures organization, handling the mobilization of equipment.

By the thirds week of July, rig activity started to pick up again.

Rains idle rigs by the dozen

Blue Sky Air of Estevan provided this photo of the water Photo courtesy Blue Sky Air


PERRY HOLMGREN

By Brian ZinchukEstevan – Th ere’s

a book in the works about the impact of oil in Saskatchewan, but you might need to put it on your Christmas list a few years from now.

University of Regina associate profes-sor Emily Eaton, and her research associate Valerie Zink, started touring Saskatchewan on June 19 and wrapped up in early July. Th ey pulled a camper as they criss-crossed the prov-ince’s oilpatch, talking to people.

Eaton is a tenured associate professor in the Department of Ge-ography and Environ-mental Studies with the University of Regina, specializing in economic geography.

Th e title of the project is “What Sus-tains Saskatchewan’s Oil Economy?”

It will tackle the way the oil economy is reshaping rural life.

“No academics have written about it,” Eaton said.

Eaton and Zink met with Pipeline News at

the Beef Bar in Este-van towards the tailend of their tour. It was a fi tting location, since many of their interviews with people have taken place in local taverns. Other times they would meet people in trailer parks where they were staying while working. Sometimes one farmer might introduce them to fi ve others.

Eaton said, “My plan is this: I start a sab-batical on July 1, 2015. I plan to write a book that year, maybe a couple of magazine stories.”

Th e gestation period will take several years, since it will need to be peer reviewed before fi nal release.

A book takes a long time to put out, Eaton noted. She plans to submit academic papers as well.

“I would like to write a book that people understand, that has the integrity of academic research, but that our interviewees can under-stand and appreciate,” she said.

“It’s a condition of my job to produce

knowledge for the pub-lic,” the professor added.

Eaton grew up in Saskatoon, where she took her undergraduate degree in international studies at the Univer-sity of Saskatchewan, followed by a masters degree at Brock Univer-sity and a PhD at the University of Toronto.

Zink grew up on a dairy farm west of Calgary, studied history at Dalhousie in Hali-fax, spent some time in Vancouver before ending up in Regina. Th ere she was co-editor/publisher of Briarpatch, Saskatchewan’s “fi ercely independent” magazine. She does freelance edit-ing and photography, and noted, “I’ve done a lot of exploring around

rural Saskatchewan.”Zink said, “I’m

interested in how farm culture and agriculture is being reshaped by the oil industry.”

“I had done 40 in-terviews before we left,” Eaton said. “I have notes on another 40 or 30. It’s getting to be a lot of material.”

Many of their inter-

views are an “hour-ish,” she noted.

“Often landown-ers will take us out and show us wells for two hours, or half a day.

“It depends on the person. We’re looking at the impacts of a growing oil economy.”

Eaton noted land-owners may have talked about wells, nuisance

and land issues. City councillors and manag-ers have brought up managing growth and mental health addiction services. Oil workers have talked about the nature of their jobs and travelling.

As for regulators, well, they don’t say a lot. Eaton said, “Th ey’ve been told not to talk.”

Research into Sask’s oil economy

Lloydminster and areaOnion Lake

First NationTh underchild

First NationKerrobertColevilleKindersleyShaunavon

EstonSwift Current & area westMaple CreekEstevanCarlyleArcolaStoughtonWeyburnWhite Bear First Nation

I’ve been everywhere, manStarting on June 19, University of Regina

associate professor Emily Eaton and her research associate Valerie Zink have travelled throughout Saskatchewan, visiting communities aff ected by the oilpatch. Th eir travels included:



By Brian Zinchuk

Carnduff – When the rains hit, Carnduff found itself right in the middle of it. And while the town was largely spared, its neighbours weren’t.

Kris Carley of C&N Oilfield is deputy fire chief and emergency measures organization co-ordinator. When the rains hit, the EMO role took over.

“On Saturday, June 28, we declared a state of emergency at 10 p.m.

that night. We were one of the first communi-ties to declare,” he said, speaking to Pipeline News three weeks after the crisis hit.

“I was at a weeding in Weyburn, and the pictures were coming in to people at the wed-ding. I got in touch with the mayor and reeve to find out what was going on. They were looking at cutting streets in town and the RM to save houses. The (sewage) lift station wasn’t keeping up,” he said. “We decid-

ed it was bet to declare a state of emergency.”

The town and RM of Mount Pleasant have a joint EMO.

The response of the community was tre-mendous. “One phone call, and we got what we needed,” Carley said.

“We cut two streets in town and a couple approaches on the south end, and a couple of roads in the RM. Every-thing else washed itself out. We were moni-toring our roads and bridges.

While it looked like Carnduff would get by, things were not looking good for three of the neighbouring communi-ties.

“We realized Gains-borough, Carievale and Alida were going to be cut off. The water was rising really fast in Gainsborough,” he said.

“We have a mutual aid agreement for our emergency services, but not a joint EMO.”

The rains continued from the Saturday, June 28 into Monday June 30. By that day, Gains-borough was being evacuated, including the local health centre.

Page B9

This paper isn’t big enough to list all those who helped out: EMO co-ordinator

When the call went out for sandbaggers, it was answered, in the hundreds.


Page B8“I called the mayor to see what was going on.

My big concern was they might get cut off road-wise. It did happen. We sent our fi re department door-to-door to assist in the evacuation,” said Carley.

Approximately 250 people were in Gainsbor-ough.

“It was strongly urged to get out of there when the water was coming up,” he said.

“Th ey and Carievale became an issue for a while. We opened our evacuation centre and had it fully running in two hours,” said Carley.

Th at centre, at the Carnduff Education Com-plex, was stocked and staff , but remarkably not one person spent one night there. People stayed with campers, family, other houses, hotels.

“People opened their houses,” Carley said.At the peak, 94 families were registered as

evacuated.People who lived north of the Antler River

were called to tell them they may be cut off , too. As for Alida, he said, “Th ey fought the water

around the clock. All of Alida’s water was coming to us. A lot of roads held back a lot of water. We could have lost our dam, and every bridge from here to North Dakota.”

Carnduff is very much an oilpatch community. But asked if anyone or any company in the patch stood out in this time of crisis, Carley said, “We can’t even begin to compile a thank you list, because we’ve miss somebody.

“We had no shortage of equipment. No one didn’t help.”

As for operations in the patch itself, he noted the RM put on a 15,000 lb. road ban in place throughout the municipality. It was lifted about a week later. Most production was shut in, and every-thing under water was shut in.

“Anything that you could get to that was on a pipeline was running. Anything that needed to be trucked had to be shut in because we weren’t allow-ing trucks on the road,” said Carley.

Th ere was no shortage of people assisting in sandbagging.

“We put out a call for sandbaggers and 200 people showed up. One sandbagging crew counted 53 trucks. It was like a convoy,” Carley said

Th ey huge amounts of food and clothing do-nated.

“You don’t have a big enough paper to list everybody,” he said.

While dealing with the broader crises, a lot of Carnduff companies had staff in Gainsborough and

Carievale with their own basements full of water. It took about a week and a half to get things

kind of back to normal in Carnduff . However, three weeks in and Gainsborough still had portapotties on all its streets due to overwhelmed water and sewer infrastructure.

Of the 20 people on the Carnduff and Mount Pleasant Fire Department, about a dozen work in the oilpatch. “We’d have 12 to 16 out every day, helping,” Carley said.

All told, there were no injuries, no deaths during the crisis. A couple of medical emergencies were dealt with, and there was one traffi c accident.

Since the town missed its Canada Day celebra-tion, they’re looking to hold a part in August. It will be a chance for everyone to let their hair down and fi re off those fi reworks that never got used on Canada Day.


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Bismarck, N.D. – In the wake of the Lac Mé-gantic disaster in Quebec last summer, there were a lot of questions about the nature of the crude oil involved in the disaster that took 47 lives? What caused the explosion?

These questions were reinforced when another train of Bakken oil exploded in a derailment near Castelton, N.D. Was there something in the oil causing these explosions?

Jeff Hume, vice-chair of strategic growth initia-tives with Continental Industries, spoke to the Williston Basin Petroleum Conference on May 21 about the Bakken crude oil characteristics study that was conducted in the wake of these explosions.

He said theses explosions have serious implica-tions for the industry.

“Following the Castelton accident, the press really came after the Bakken,” Hume said. “We needed to conduct a scientific test.

“Safety is job one with every company in our industry.”

That testing would look at the true volatility of Bakken crude, what it is classified as, what packing group (for shipping) it should be, and H2S content.

Fifteen wells were selected from across the

American Bakken play, including different opera-tors. Some had vapour recovery systems, some didn’t. In total, 152 samples were taken. There were no signs of “spiking,” he said.

Hume noted the Bakken has been produced for over 60 years, but its recent growth has had large impacts.

“We’ve saved the east coast refining industry, and now we’re saving the west coast,” he said, add-ing, “It’s very good oil.”

Covering the entire basin, they found these numbers: 40.7 API average gravity, 99.1 degrees boiling point, 5.7 per cent light ends.

There were no changes in composition from the top or bottom of tanks. Seven rail locations were also looked at.

“We saw very little H2S, maybe one part per million,” Hume said. There was also very little cor-rosion tied to Bakken crude oil.

“Is the Bakken corrosive? We hear a lot of that in the press.”

Hume said it has a very low total acid number. Three labs tested identical Bakken samples.

One rail operator shipped five cars to Louisiana. The oil was tested at both ends of the journey.

“What they got at both ends was very close,” Hume said.

The key findings, he said, was Bakken oil is great quality oil, desirable for refiners. Boiling point tests are ongoing. “Everything points to Bakken is properly classified as a flammable liquid.”

Three studies, including one from Transport Canada, are coming to the same conclusions.

Page B11


Is there something different about Bakken oil?


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29:1c

Page B10“Is there a best practice? Is there a heat/temperature/pressure combination

that does better? Is there some retention time that might be better than others, to get the absolute most stable barrel out of the Bakken that we can? Th e way we’re doing it now is working great. We’re fi tting what fi ts the rules. But can we do better? We’re going to look at all of that. We’re going to try to develop some standards that we’ll use, some work for operations, and then we’ll have a fi nal report in about a month and a half,” said Hume.

Th is testing will also be of use in defi ning a new benchmark of oil. Just as West Texas Intermediate and Brent are defi ned as known standards, this char-acterization study can be used to help establish the “BKN”, or Bakken bench-mark. Th is will create a reference point for buyers and sellers.

Hume said. “One of the last things we want to do is establish a Bakken benchmark, that will ensure everything we do is shipped out of here the same.

Th at way everything that leaves the lease and goes onto a rail car or pipeline, when it gets to the other end, it will be within the range we have for delivery. Th at brings not only value to us, which is a side thing, but it ensures the quality we’re shipping this oil at is getting all the way to the marketplace and to all the stakeholders in between. From Williston to the refi nery, they will know exactly what they are getting. Nothing’s been spiked into it, nothing’s been refi ned into it. Th ey’ll be getting the real deal.”

Bismarck, N.D. – What about those tankers?

Jeff Hume, vice-chair of strategic growth initiatives with Continental Industries, spoke with reporters at the Williston Basin Petroleum Confer-ence on May 21 following his presen-tation on the Bakken crude oil char-acteristics study that was conducted in the wake of the Lac-Mégantic, Que., and Castelton, N.D., crude-by-rail explosions.

“Most of the local media under-stands what we’re doing with crude oil. Some of the national media has blown it out of proportion. Th ey’ve come up with things that try to change the word ‘volatility.’ It our world, that’s any fl uid turning into a gas, the volatility of it. Th ey try to turn that into explosiveness, like ni-troglycerin in a tank car,” Hume said.

“Th at was one of the things we had to get out with a study. Th is is what volatility is. It’s going to be tough to educate everyone about what it is. Volatility in the chemical world is, as you heat the fl uid, the light ends come off and create gasses and

vapour pressure. Th ose two kind of go hand in hand. Th at has to be where you have to contain it, in this rail car container. We’ve shown we can safely hold it in the rail car and tender. We get from point A, North Dakota, to point B, east coast, west coast, Gulf coast, intact, altogether, safely, and nothing’s leaked from that car. It’s a safe container to put it in from point A to point B.

“Th e impact safety is a diff erent study. Th e API is working on that also.”

Allegations of possible spiking of rail cars with propane or butane proved unfounded, according to Hume. At no place were there con-nections to put propane or butane into cars.

“API needs to know what our crude looks like to make sure we have the proper containment. From what we’ve tested, it fi ts the specifi cations FIMSA has today for the rail cars we’re shipping it in. For today’s rules, we’re moving it in proper contain-ment,” Hume said.

Page B12

What about those tankers?


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Are these tanks appropriate?

Page B11

Pipeline News asked about Transport

Canada’s intentions to phase out DOT 111 rail cars in their current form, the type used

Lac-Mégantic, and if the they see similar things happening on the U.S. side.

“I’m aware that Transport Canada will phase out DOT 111 cars by 2017,” said Kari Cutting, vice-president of the North Dakota petroleum Council.

She noted Bakken oil has 11.5 to 11.8 pounds per square inch vapour pressure, while DOT 111 rail cars were designed to handle 100 psi.

“Essentially those cars have a built-in margin of safety that is many times more than the vapour pres-sure we’re talking about with Bakken.

“If you change from a 111 car to a jacketed rail car or 9/16 inch jacketed rail car, you’re going to end up reducing the capacity

of that rail car. Th e rail cars will be heavier. Th ere’s a maximum weight that can be handled on the tracks and rail. You’re mak-ing that rail car heavier reduced capacity, and leads to more move-ments of more rail cars on the tracks,” Cutting said.

“Adding more steel to make a thicker shell may not be the answer to not having a breach of that rail car. API is working very rapidly on this issue and on the testing methodology.

“We expect they will come up with ad-ditional rail data later on. It’s important to recognize switching to a diff erent rail car isn’t exactly a perfect world, either.

Hume said, “PHMSA (Pipeline and Hazardous Materi-als Safety Administra-tion) is trying to do the

right thing. Th ey need the data.

“Th rough this study we’re showing that this barrel fi ts with the CFR standards for the crude and the car it’s in. Does it need a bet-ter car? A stronger car? Th ose questions are go-ing to be answered. As well, do we need better track maintenance? Th at’s one of the things the railroads have signed an agreement with the DOT, slowing speeds down. Th ere’s lots of work to be done and lots of minds working on it today.

“All of this has to start with basic data, and that’s what this report does. It tells you what we have, what it looks like. As we go through the modelling of tank cars and move-ment on the rail line outside of the scope of these committees,” said Hume.


Estevan – Kristof Dumais is working to become what is a rare breed indeed, a commis-sioned Saskatchewan Land Surveyor. He’s undergoing his training with Midwest Surveys in Estevan, which was where Pipeline News caught up with him. Heavy rains in recent days meant it was one of Dumais’ rare days in the office. Usually he’s in the field.

“I’m from Freder-icton, New Brunswick. I’ve been out here two-and-a-half years,” he said.

He clued in quick in regards to fitting in, as indicated by the Sas-katchewan Roughrider hat on his head. “It’s definitely ‘Rider Na-tion’,” Dumais respond-ed when asked about it.

“We don’t have a team in New Bruns-wick, so when I came here, a field guy said, ‘Drink Pilsner and cheer for the Riders, and you’ll be alright.’”

Thus, Dumais, 24, is now part of Rider Nation.

It also doesn’t hurt that his company’s of-fice tends to have a lot of Rider green posted around it.

Dumais' fiancé is a registered nurse at St. Joseph's Hospital in Estevan. “It's nice, surveying and nursing. You can go anywhere,” he said about both of their careers.

“I went to the University of New Brunswick in Frederic-

ton. I have a bachelor of science in geomatics en-gineering. I’m working towards my Saskatch-ewan Land Surveyor.”

As Saskatchewan Land Surveyor com-mission is a professional certification similar to a professional engi-neer or medical doctor. Only 332 people have held the designation since it began in 1910. Legal surveys require the stamp of a land surveyor, and thus field surveyors work under land surveyors.

“I’m just over a year into the SLS process, and I probably have an-other year before I have my commission here,” Dumais said.

Asked about the very low number of people who have achieved that com-mission, he said, “It’s definitely a tight bunch of guys.

“I actually didn’t know anything about surveying in high school. In my first year of university I was actually enrolled in civil engineering. In my first semester I did my intro-duction to surveying. I just loved and switched and never looked back.”

Dumais noted only the University of Calgary and Univer-sity of New Brunswick have accredited degree programs for profes-sional surveying. With his degree, he can also pursue a professional engineer designation as well, but that’s “not a big thing on my sched-

ule,” Dumais said.“Right now I’m a

SLS-IT, a land surveyor in training. I’m in the field and office. I’m usually full-time in the field. It keeps you in shape.”

When he’s not walking or using the 4x4 pickup, a tracked quad is Dumais’ mode of transportation in the field.

“I have a company quad and I have tracks on it. You go slower, but she’ll crawl through anything. You won’t get stuck in the mud. She’ll crawl through creeks. It’s very good in win-ter. I can go anywhere, I have more room for equipment, but it’s one person,” he said.

The training in-volves hitting all aspects of surveying. “You need a certain amount of

legal surveying work,” he said. “I do residential, industrial and municipal construction, as opposed to wellsites and pipe-lines. In town, I run my transit quite a bit.”

A transit is an opti-cal telescope on a tripod used in surveying. It has become supplanted by satellite navigation sys-tems in many instances, but still has its purpose.

About 30 per cent of Dumais’ work is in the oilpatch.

“We have lots of guys who are dedicated (to the oilpatch). Some are dedicated to certain companies,” he said.

All-in-all, it’s meant to produce a well-rounded experience. “I will be dealing with everything across the board,” he said.

Asked how he end-ed up in Saskatchewan, Dumais replied, “Back home in New Bruns-wick, it’s quite slow for work. There’s a lot of politics, a lot of family-owned businesses. If you didn’t know a guy who knew a guy...

“A lot of jobs re-quire five year’s experi-ence. The year before I

graduated, I did a work term. Survey companies from across Canada come to UNB. They did presentations and in-terviews. I knew I liked Midwest. I asked for a bigger centre – Regina or Calgary. They needed someone here for a summer term. The next year I got placed here.

“I got a feel for it that summer. I loved all the guys here, and the fresh, dusty air. There’s no wind back home.”

Dumais’ next step is to finish his land sur-veyor commission. Then most of his work will be in the office.

“I woudn’t see myself doing anything other than surveying. Surveyors stay in the profession. Many work towards getting their lawyer (degree), but not me.”

Dumais has bought a house in Estevan, and it looks like he plans to stay.

New Brunswick transplant knows who to cheer for

Kristof Dumais is working towards his Saskatchewan Land Surveyor commission with Midwest Surveys. He’s originally from New Brunswick. Photo by Brian Zinchuk


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Weyburn – Before pretty much any work can take place in the oil-fi eld, the surveyors must be there fi rst. Th ere are no wells drilled, no leas-es prepared, no pipeline right-of-ways cleared, until the surveyors do their job fi rst. One of those companies that plays a key surveying role is Altus Geomatics.

Over the years Altus Geomatics has grown through the acquisition

of several small family-owned survey compa-nies, one of which was Condon Survey Group in Weyburn.

It was started by Jim Condon, Saskatchewan Land Surveyor No. 181, uncle of Ryan Malo-ney, the current branch manager who spoke to Pipeline News on July 4.

Weyburn is one of 16 offi ces Altus Geo-matics has in Canada. Other branches in Saskatchewan include Regina, Yorkton, Swift

Current, Saskatoon and Lloydminster.

Jim’s brother-in-law Pat Maloney, Ryan’s father, started out as a chainman, measuring by hand what is today done with either GPS or laser. Pat would go onto get his Saskatchewan Land Surveyor commission in 1983, acquiring SLS number 243.

Indeed, it’s turned into quite the family aff air, as Ryan’s sister Heather, SLS 321 now runs the Yorkton offi ce

of Altus Geomatics. She got her commission in 2012. Ryan got his SLS number, 295, in 2008.

Gwen Maloney, Pat’s wife and Ryan and Heather’s mother, also works in the Weyburn offi ce. Only the third sibling, Sarah Pierce, is not in surveying. She’s a kindergarten teacher in Weyburn.

A constant standby has been work in the Weyburn fi eld, where Condon started doing work in 1984.

“I worked in the fi eld since 1997,” Ryan said. “I started as an assistant in ’95. We’ve been doing a lot of work out there. Th ey’re great to work with.”

A very large por-tion of Altus Geomat-ics’ work in southeast

Saskatchewan is in the oilfi eld.

“Probably about 70 per cent,” Ryan said. Th e remainder is residential land development and construction layout. Of course, much of that has been driven by growth in the oilpatch.

“We’ve been doing subdivisions in lots of little towns – Yellow Grass, Ogema, Carlyle, Stoughton, Francis,” he said, noting a rising tide fl oats all boats.

“We’ve more than doubled since 2005, our business, employee numbers, everything. It all follows the develop-ment of those fi elds.”

“We have nine crews right now, two people per crew,” Ryan said.

Page B15

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Ryan and Pat Ma-loney act as the offi ce’s land surveyors. Th ey also have two project man-agers, two admin staff members and six CAD operators.

Th e Weyburn offi ce looks after the region from Assiniboia to the Manitoba border and from the U.S. border to Highway 1.

One area they’ve been working in is the Flat Lake area, near Lake Alma, along the U.S. border. It has re-ceived attention recently due to Crescent Point Energy Corp.’s recent statements that devel-opment of the Torquay formation in that region could be as big as their Viewfi eld play. View-fi eld is the heart of the Saskatchewan Bakken play.

“We’ve been doing work in Flat Lake. We did a lot of work there in the 1980s for vertical wells,” Ryan said.

“We’re pretty fortu-nate with all our offi ces in Canada, we have the ability to staff up for big projects. Th e nature of the surveyors industry is travel,” he said. “Do whatever you have to do to stay working. Howev-er we are fortunate with our geographic reach our crews do not have to travel as much.”

A crew might only put on 30 kilometres in a day doing work in town, but on another day they could clock 500 kilometres doing

work near Redvers. Th e 4x4 truck gets

them to the site, but the ubiquitous quads on the back are starting to be replaced.

“A lot of our crews are switching to side-by-sides,” he said, referring to the wave of all-terrain vehicles that are sweeping the indus-try. Th ey are replacing the traditional quad and snowmobile.

“Quads don’t have rollover protection. You have a seat, desk. It’s almost like working out of a truck. We allow our guys to do either/or. Some clients require the roll over protection.”

Th ey also have seat-belts and speed limiters. Side-by-sides are much easier to drive because you don’t need to shift your body weight to make corners.

“It often removes a young, inexperienced assistant from driving,” he added, since usually the crew chief does the driving adding to the overall safety

Th ere’s also a cargo box to haul stakes, a much better solution than strapping them down to a cargo rack.

Th e downside is the relatively nimble 4x4 now has to pull a trailer, which can be a head-ache in tight quarters. Remember, surveyors are often there before there are any roads, because a road can’t be built until it has been surveyed in the fi rst place.

“Th at’s a challenge

in itself,” he said.Th e fl ipside is the

trailer and truck can stay on the beaten path and one can use the side-by-side to go into the rough stuff .

Field surveyors have the option of going with company machines or upgrading and operating their own equipment. Th is also provides them the ability to use that equipment for personal use off the job. Th ey’re remitted payment based on on-the-job usage.

Asked about what he sees coming in the future, Ryan said, “We’ve had a big run up in drilling in the last few years. I expect more fl owlines, more facilities. Saskatchewan needs increased pipeline access for transmission lines.”

Weld mapping and integrity is also an im-portant part of pipeline surveying – recording the heat number, pipe number, coating types and three-dimensional position of every weld. It is essentially a case of connect the dots. If you know where the welds are, the pipe is the

straight line between them, so you survey all the weld locations.

As for the technol-ogy employed, Ryan noted it is becoming more and more accurate. One concept – LIDAR, or light detection and ranging, is coming to play. It is often mounted from a small plane.

“We’re also using fi xed wing UAVs,” he said. Th ese are used to create ortho-rectifi ed imagery. “We take the

photographs and can calculate distance,” he said. “We do it more and more. One area it’s really suitable for is municipal land develop-ment. Especially with concerns about fl ooding, we can do a three-di-mensional topographic map of a quarter-section with one half-hour fl ight.

“Traditionally, a survey crew might have taken a day or two.”

Flood elevations

are a big concern, Ryan noted.

Th is type of topo-graphic map can result in two to four centime-tre horizontal accuracy and three to six centi-metre vertical accuracy. “Plenty accurate for drainage,” he said.

“We did a few quarter sections for the city of Weyburn and Yorkton.

“Prices are coming down and the quality is going up.”

Estevan – Sulzer Chemtech Canada Inc. of Calgary, Alberta pleaded guilty to one charge under occupational health and safety (OHS) legislation and was fi ned $14,000 in Estevan Provincial Court on June 23, 2014.

Th e company pleaded guilty to contravening section 124 of the regulations (failure to ensure that any opening or hole in a fl oor, roof or other work surface into which a worker could step or fall is securely covered and/or protected) and was fi ned $10,000 with a $4,000 surcharge.

Sulzer Chemtech Canada Inc. was charged af-ter a company employee was injured at the Carbon Capture Project at the Boundary Dam near Este-van when he fell 15 feet through a hole in the fl oor of the worksite on Jan. 22, 2013. One other charge against the company was stayed in court.

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Bismarck, N.D. – Th e never-ending delays on TransCanada’s proposed Keystone XL pipeline are frustrating not only Canadians, but the Americans who would actually build most of the pipeline.

Th ousands of those potential workers are represented by LiUNA (Laborers’ International Union of North Amer-ica). Th e union was unable to get a booth at the Williston Basin Conference in Bis-marck, ND, May 21-23, as booth space sold out quicker than a hot rock concert. Instead they parked a very bright orange semi truck and trailer, slathered in chrome, at the edge of the adjacent parking lot and off ered up a barbe-cue.

Kevin Pranis, LiUNA marketing manager for Minne-sota and North Dakota, said the union has over 1,000 members in these locals, including ap-proximately 450 in their pipeline division. He expected that number to peak at around 600 this summer. Th ose numbers don’t factor in Keystone work.

“It’s been challeng-ing, fi ghting for Key-stone. Th e important

thing is the industry moving forward,” he said.

“We’re seeing tremendous growth in pipeline construction, from gathering to oil and gas mainlines.”

As of mid-May, Minnesota had not yet approved Enbridge’s Sandpiper line which would substantially increase Bakken take-away capacity. Pranis said there was strong support for Sandpiper from their members and other crafts.

“Northern Minne-sota is very pro-energy and for natural resourc-es,” said Pranis.

North Dakota organizer Steve Cor-tina said, “Th ere was a misunderstanding with Keystone and Sandpiper that if you don’t build the pipeline, they won’t pump the oil. Th at’s obviously not true. Now they acknowledge oil is moving by rail.”

Noting how there are now concerns about the safety of crude-by-rail, especially after the Lac Mégantic disaster, he said, “It’s the defi ni-tion of hutzpah – the kid who kills his par-ents and calls himself an orphan, throwing himself at the mercy of the courts.

“We’re passing up a cleaner, safer way of moving that oil.

“It’s unfortunate. Pipeline construction aff ords amazing op-portunities (for work-ers) to turn their lives around. Th ere’s plenty of work in North Dakota. Th at’s why we’re seeing a boom in union labour. We’re uniquely able to supply skilled labour.”

Cory Bryson said, “I worked on the original Keystone pipeline for three years. I mainly did lowering in and some environmental crews.”

As for the new Key-stone XL, he said, “I’d have guys on that job. People like my father still work in the fi eld and rely on projects like that.” Photo by Brian Zinchuk

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By Brian ZinchukEstevan – When

most people look at a lease for the fi rst time,

they see the cleared land and berms, perhaps a pumpjack on a complet-ed well. When surveyors

see a lease, they might see a fi eld of wheat billowing in the wind. Th ere is no defi ned lease

until they mark it.After the seismic

survey, the surveyors are the fi rst to set foot on an area slated for develop-ment.

Steve Drew is the Estevan branch manager for Midwest Surveys Inc. He’s held the posi-tion for three years. His Saskatchewan Land Surveyor number is easy enough to remember – he’s SLS 306, mean-ing he’s only the 306th person to receive his land surveyor commission since the province fi rst started recognizing the profession over 100 years ago. It’s a small crowd, those land surveyors.

“In 1994 I started as a summer student. I went to SIAST in Moose Jaw for surveying

engineering technology,” he said.

Approximately 40 people work out of the Estevan location. Mid-west deploys people as needed. Th e day Pipeline News spoke to Drew was just after torrential rains fl ooded much of southeast Saskatchewan, yet they still had a crew from Alberta working not far from Redvers. Drew noted they pull in additional crews as needed.

Th e Estevan of-fi ce covers about a 200 kilometre radius within Canada, and includes southwest Manitoba in addition to southeast Saskatchewan. David Quirk, who used to head up the Estevan offi ce, has stuck around as needed since he held a Manitoba land surveyor commission. However, with Drew in the process of getting his Manitoba commission, Quirk’s semi-retirement can become more full-time retirement.

“I’m getting my commission this week,” Drew said, adding about Quirk that, “he’ll have more time to golf.”

Having a qualifi ed land surveyor sign off is crucial when it comes to surveying, much in the same way a professional engineer will stamp plans or a doctor pre-scribes medicine. Drew explained one must have a qualifi ed land surveyor for each jurisdiction.

In the fi eld, sur-veyors usually work in pairs – a crew chief and an assistant. “Party chief is another term,” Drew said.

“We’re running 10 to 11 trucks,” he said. Each truck carries one crew.

Th ese days the vast majority of survey work is done using satellite navigation, using the U.S. Global Position-ing System (GPS) and Russian GLONASS. A third constellation of satellites, the European Galileo system, is not yet up and running.

“Th e GLONASS helps,” Drew said. “Th e Americans developed GPS in the Cold War,

and the USSR developed the GLONASS system.

“You have to have more satellites to work with. You need a minimum of four. Most systems need fi ve. With both GPS and GLONASS, you have 14 to 18. You have all the diff erent checks on your position.”

By using both systems combined, surveyors are able to get accuracies of better than a centimetre, according to Drew.

Only about 10 per cent of their work in the fi eld, at the most, is spent using an optical transit, the surveyor’s telescope on a tripod that had once been the main instrument of the industry.

Satellite-based sur-veying is not new, either, though. “Th ere hasn’t been a lot of chance in conventional equipment in 20 years,” said Drew. “Some of the advance-ments are on robotic technology. It’s been around for 20 years, but it’s better now and has come down in price. It’ll track you. It’ll com-municate with your data collector.”

Th ere are even some cool smartphone apps out there too, he noted.

Drones are starting to creep in to the profes-sion.

No matter what the toys are, a crucial point in surveying is still the man or woman on the ground, slogging through mud, fi elds and bushes all the while feeding the mosquito population. In an area that had received about seven inches of rain in the previous two days, they still had a crew working in the Redvers area.

“Th ere’s two guys out there. Th ey drove as far as they could, ‘quad-ded’ in seven or eight kilometres, and are now on foot, on site,” Drew said.

“Th ey had a choice to go. Th ey’re more than capable of assessing if they can go.”

“We’re on foot in the summer anyway because of the crop.”

Page B19

Tromping through crops that untie boots to survey leases


OILFIELD CONST. LTD.

Page B18

Going out to take some pictures of survey-ors in the fi eld, Drew noted that it’s a lot easier to walk through wheat than canola.

“Canola is killer,” he said, noting it will untie your boots as you’re walking. One needs to double-knot their bootlaces just to keep them on.

Drew said, “I was in the fi eld from 1994 to 2010.”

Now in the offi ce, he said, “You defi -nitely don’t get as much exercise as in the fi eld. It helps keep you in shape.”

Th e oilfi eld accounts for a large portion of the Estevan offi ce’s work. “We’d be at 75 to 80 per cent,” Drew said.

Th e remainder is largely construction work and municipal surveying.

“It’s a busy year, but weather impacts ev-erything,” he said. “Th e storm this week is a setback.”

At a new drill site, clients will give the theoretical co-ordinates – bottom hole, casing point, section boundar-ies, etc.

“Th e geologist will fi gure out where the anomalies are and what to hit,” Drew said.

Once on site, the surveyors will fi nd the survey monuments nearby. “Th ey sometimes aren’t always there, so we have to put them there.”

Surveyors keep a chisel to mark the steel pins with Roman nu-merals. It’s easier to use a chisel than a series of numeric dyes.

Explaining one ex-ample, he said, “For this well, we built the entire section. We surveyed the centre and bottom. Th e

bottom hole has certain setbacks, usually 100 metre setbacks.”

Th e well centre location is marked with a spike and three stakes. “We mark the well centre, lease corners, roadway in, and any facilities.”

Surveyors will sweep for underground utilities. Often the oil company will have a line locator company come in and do a secondary sweep, just in case.

Th e surveyors provide feedback to the oil company. “Often we’ll meet with the consultant on site,” said Drew. If need be, that feedback might involve moving the well to avoid problematic areas like swamps, dugouts, farmyards, slopes and

the like. In western Sas-

katchewan, minimal disturbance wells also have to suit the terrain.

“Th e other consid-erations are the land-owners, too. You want to minimize the impact of the well on the land-owner,” Drew said.

“Before we do these wellsites, there’s a land company involved. Th e survey is done before the lease is signed,” he said.

Beyond the fi eld work, support staff is also very important. In Estevan, Midwest has four professional land surveyors. Th ey also have several technicians. Th is includes geomatics technologists doing cal-culations, quality control and GPS processing.

“We have six draft-ing staff . One works remotely from Regina,” said Drew.

Administrative sup-port is also a key factor in keeping the business operational. “We have six staff dedicated to ad-ministrative functions,” said Drew.

Th e Flat Lake area near Lake Alma has been getting more interest of late. “We’ve seen more and more in the last fi ve or six years,” Drew said. “Th ings are defi nitely moving.”

However, with such a sparse population and with few services, he said, “I call it the no-coff ee zone.” Th at’s because there’s really only one place to get a coff ee, and it’s not even close to Flat Lake. Steve Drew is one of Midwest Survey’s Saskatchewan Land Surveyors. He heads up the

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Story and photos by Brian ZinchukEstevan – Surveyors come and go, but it is the stakes they leave behind that

tell those who follow where everything is and where it is supposed to go.Estevan Diversifi ed Services has staked its claim in the oilpatch by making

stakes for the surveyors who work in the oilpatch.“We provide services for people with intellectual disabilities,” said Garnet

Hall, who has been production manager for Estevan Diversifi ed Services for the last 10 years.

Th e work is a combination of therapy and jobs. “Our objective on the produc-tion end is to provide paid employment,” he said. Everyone gets a paycheque.

“Having a job provides a sense of self-worth,” Hall added. Workers are part of the community, have a place to go, a job, and a sense of accom-plishment.

Th e organization has been around since 1973 under diff erent names.

“Over the years we’ve done a variety of things, depending on what work was available. Picnic tables are a big one,” he said.

Th ey average 200 picnic tables a year. Th e improved Woodlawn Regional Park at Boundary Dam reservoir recently took a large order.

Residential wooden fencing is another main-stay.

“For a number of years, we made toy boxes for SARC,” Hall said.

“We’re more of a social enterprise. We do have to make a profi t at the end of the day. Ide-ally, we’d like to transition people (to the regular workforce).”

One of their employees also works at a local supermarket, for instance.

“Ultimately, we would like to work ourselves out of business,” Hall said. However, there will likely always be a need for something along the lines of what Estevan Diversifi ed Services does.

When the Estevan brickyard was in operation they would make a lot of wooden pallets, but that plant shut down around 12 years ago.

Th ey’ve made core boxes and crates that have seen potash core shipped to Germany.

Starting in 2007, they got into making stakes in a big way. Th at timing coin-cides with the advent of the Bakken play and corresponding growth in the survey industry in the region to service that play.

“Seventy to 75 per cent of our business is now stakes, as self-generating rev-

enue,” Hall said. “Up to fi ve days a week, we’re pounding out stakes.”Th ey’ll do about 100 lifts of stakes per year, at 50 bundles of stakes per lift. Th ere’s some competition from Medicine Hat, he noted, adding it’s hard to

compete against larger manufacturers. Most of their product goes to southeast Saskatchewan, with three-quarters of their lathe going to Weyburn. Th ere sis-ter agency Weyburn Wor-Kin dips the lathe in paint colour-coded for standard markings, i.e. red for power, blue for water.

Estevan Diversifi ed Services also dips lathes as needed. Initially they would make stakes one at a time with a table saw. Now the pro-

cess is broken down into an assembly line. On July 14, they were making lathes. High quality lumber is brought in from two mills in northern Alberta. Knots result in wastage, so they are avoided.

“Knots are a killer. Two knots can ruin a board,” Hall said.

Using 2x6 spruce boards, they are cut into four-foot lengths. Next two workers use a jig and a band saw to cut the angle for the point. Th en the 2x6 is placed through a special machine which slices each board into the thin lathes.

Th ose lathes are checked for defects, then stacked and bundled.

Any wastage is processed into wood pellets for heating, but they’ve had some issues with their pel-let machine.

Hall notes that the process is well-suited for the workers, as it can be broken down into many components with simple, repetitive steps, providing work for eight to nine people.

A few years ago they supplied stakes for the Enbridge Bakken expansion project. “It was an excellent project for us,” Hall said.

Since these stakes needed to be tall enough to be seen in canola, they were cut fi ve feet long instead of four feet.

“Growth in the oil industry has helped us in all kinds of ways,” said Hall. For instance, another big seller is the shorter, but thicker, concrete form stakes, used for all the concrete applications that have arisen from the oil-driven boost in the economy. Even those Boundary Dam picnic tables are a spinoff from the oilpatch, he noted.

As for the future, Hall said the trend is to transition intellectually disabled people to regular employment, and that people with disabled children expect more for those children then what has been available for them in the past.

As for making stakes, he’s optimistic for growth in line locating and pipelin-ing.

Staking out the oilpatch


About Altus Geomatics

From extensive mapping services to site surveys, Altus Geomatics is the market leader in advanced, customized

solutions for a wide variety of consulting projects. Utilizing innovative and proprietary technology that not only makes

research-gathering more efficient and less costly, but also ensures accurate, effective geographical data, our experts

facilitate complex decision-making for businesses, communities, governments and industries. Our complementary

and diversified range of service offerings includes Construction Surveys, Mapping Services, Field Surveys, Internet

GIS Mapping, Legal/Municipal Land Surveys, 3D Laser Scanning, and Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR), and

Environmental & Forestry. Altus Geomatics is strategically positioned in all four western provinces, as well as New

Brunswick and Nova Scotia, to deliver the service and expertise that guarantees results, and mitigates risk, across all

project phases, regardless of sector, scope or region.

Equipped and strategically located to drive your project forward in 19 locations across Canada.

About Altus Group Limited

Altus Group is a leading provider of independent commercial real estate consulting and advisory services, software and data

solutions. We operate five interrelated Business Units, bringing together years of experience and a broad range of expertise into one

comprehensive platform: Research, Valuation and Advisory; ARGUS Software; Property Tax Consulting; Cost Consulting and Project

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Australia and Asia Pacific. Altus Group’s clients include financial institutions, private and public investment funds, insurance companies,

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CALGARY

840 7th Avenue SW Suite 900

Calgary, Alberta T2P 3G2

Phone: 403.234.7599

Fax: 403.261.4712

EDMONTON

17327 106A Avenue

Edmonton, Alberta T5S 1M7

Phone: 780.481.3399

Fax: 780.481.3841

GRANDE PRAIRIE

11417 91st Avenue

Grande Prairie, Alberta T8V 5Z3

Phone: 780.532.6793

Fax: 780.532.7694

LLOYDMINSTER

1812 50th Avenue

Bay 10

Lloydminster, Alberta T9V 2W7

Phone: 780.875.6130

Fax: 780.875.1658

RED DEER

303A, 4406 50 Avenue

Red Deer, Alberta T4N 3Z6

Phone: 780.236.1603

MEDICINE HAT

1601 Dunmore Road S.E.

Suite 202

Medicine Hat, Alberta T1A 1Z8

Phone: 403.528.4215

Fax: 403.528.4287

HIGH LEVEL (FIELD OFFICE)

High Level, Alberta

Phone: 708.926.4123

Fax: 780.926.4550

REGINA

311 Albert Street

Regina, Saskatchewan S4R 2N6

Phone: 306.522.5628

Fax: 306.359.0992

SASKATOON

226 Cardinal Crescent

Saskatoon, Saskatchewan

S7L 6H8

Phone: 306.343.8187

Fax: 306.343.3325

SWIFT CURRENT

300 Begg Street West

Swift Current, Saskatchewan

S9H 0K6

Phone: 306.773.7733

Fax: 306.778.3678

WEYBURN

615 Railway Avenue

Weyburn, Saskatchewan

S4H 0A9

Phone: 306.842.6060

Fax: 306.842.7872

YORKTON

38 Smith Street

Yorkton, Saskatchewan S3N 3X5

Phone: 306.783.4100

Fax: 306.782.4440

BRANDON *

100 - 158 11th Street

Brandon, Manitoba R7A 4J4

Phone: 204.727.0651

Fax: 204.727.5247

VIRDEN *

280 Ashburton Street East

Box 307

Virden, Manitoba R0M 2C0

Phone: 204.748.6860

Fax: 204.748.6165

WINNIPEG *

661 Century Street

Winnipeg, Manitoba R3H 0L9

Phone: 204.272.2600

Fax: 204.272.2620

MONCTON

835 Champlain Street

Suite 200

Dieppe, New Brunswick E1A 1P6

Phone: 506.858.2787

Fax: 506.858.2792

DARTMOUTH

Atboro House, Suite 9 South

130 Eileen Stubbs Avenue

Dartmouth, Nova Scotia B3B 2C4

Phone: 902.468.5798

Fax: 902.468.6919

1.800.465.6233 altusgeomatics.com [email protected]

By Brian ZinchukWeyburn – With nearly everyone these days

carrying a smartphone that has more capabilities than Star Trek could have dreamed of, it was only a matter of time until someone came up with an app for surveying.

Altus Geomatics actually has several. These aren’t $1 apps like Angry Birds, but serious tools for serious work.

“We pride ourselves on mobile technology,” said Ryan Maloney, Weyburn branch manager for Altus Geomatics.

“We’ve been developing apps for our own use, and now they are available for the public.

“All of our field crews get an iPad.”

Maloney pointed out a pdf file on an iPad can replace a two-inch stack of paper in the truck. Altus Geomatic’s field work is now “moving toward be-ing paperless,” he said. “We’ve greatly reduced our paper usage.”

For instance, a crew might have taken 50 to 100 pages of paper out on a job. But if they are in the field and get dispatched to a different job, they would have had to find a way to get the new paperwork to them. Now, a new job setup can be e-mailed to the crew in the field.

The apps are called LSD Nav, Nav Photo and LSD Nav Pro, priced from about $90 for the Nav to $300 for the Nav Pro.

Page B23

There’s an app for that, even in surveying

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Page B22LSD Nav and LSD

Nav Pro will interpret the Dominion land survey location based on the GPS of the device. “Anywhere you go, you can get your land loca-tion,” Maloney said. “A consultant can stand in a fi eld and get an off set. Th ey can pick a wellsite without getting a crew out.”

Th e GPS in an iPhone or iPad is nowhere close to the accuracy of survey equipment that will not only pull in signals from the American Global Positioning System, but also the Russian GLONASS satellites. But it doesn’t need to be. Just like MP3s that don’t have the same audio fi delity of vinyl records, for many purposes, they are good enough. Th e same can be said for these apps. Th e consul-tant doesn’t need to be accurate to the centime-

tre when determining a well needs to be moved because it was initially planned for the middle of a slough.

Asked if that can-nibalizes some of their work, Maloney respond-ed, “Th ey still require a survey crew for a well licence. It improves their effi ciency. We may lose some time, but it’s better for our clients.”

Th eir apps go well beyond that. “We can create and insert custom maps for our clients,” he said.

Th e apps can use Google Maps imagery as well as their own data. Custom maps show details like lease bound-aries and power lines.

“Th is was designed for us to make our job easier for scouting wellsites. A lot of people saw it and wanted it,” Maloney said.

Th ose people included truck drivers, consultants, and environ-

mentalists. For instance, an environmentalist can walk a pipeline right-of-way without having it surveyed fi rst. In the app they can “drop a pin” and e-mail a screenshot for items of interest, i.e. “I think something is wrong here.”

Th ey can be used for aerial inspections as well. Blue Sky Air of Estevan, which special-izes in pipeline aerial inspections, uses custom maps for their pilots, based on their fl ight plans. “It saved him time and money, eliminating the need to circle.”

Scott Piper, owner of Blue Sky Air, said they’ve been using Altus Geomatics apps for about a year now for identifying land loca-tions. It can be done by simply tapping the

screen on the device. “It overlays it on a

Google map. We use the LSDs it provides. We’ve been looking at using the camera application, which overlays the loca-tion,” said Piper.

Another application Altus Geomatics has focused on is geotag-ging. Nav Photo uses the built-in gyroscope

within the iPhone or iPad to give a compass bearing for photos in addition to the land co-ordinates. Th at photo is then stamped not only with where you are, but what direction you are looking. It stores the picture with that infor-mation superimposed on the photo.

Yet another applica-

tion is used for safety co-ordination. It is used for routing, fi rst aid transportation planning (FATP), mapping of medical facilities, etc. Th e company also uses it as part of their regular safe work plans includ-ing crew tracking and completing job safety analysis ( JSA)’s for each project.


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Estevan - With all the recent heavy rains in southeast Saskatchewan, undoubtedly there will be some soft spots. But when you are drilling, a soft spot can be a real headache, even if matted. If the rig comes out of level, it can cause all sort of issues. Th e answer? Level the rig.

Th at’s what Ken Johnson of Estevan does. His North Portal-based operation is Johnson Delivery and Rig Leveling Ltd. He started up three years ago.

“Th e company I was working for, Ensign, their consultant, Terry Carpenter, asked me if I would be interested in this, because I would be good at it,” Johnson said.

“My goal was to start a hot shot com-pany,” he said.

Why is it important to keep a rig level?

“You want a proper wellbore alignment,” he responded. “Th e main thing is safety. When

the rig is off level, it’s hard on everybody – the guy up the stick, the guys on the fl oor. Th e slips won’t go in or out properly.”

Indeed, diffi culty with the slips binding is a surefi re sign the rig needs to be level, ac-cording to Johnson.

“I usually don’t get a call until the slips won’t go in and out,” he said.

Th at led to John-son’s tagline: “If you’re in a bind, keep me in mind.”

“I’ve been to rigs where I had to lift three inches or three feet.”

What causes a rig to be out of level? Human error is often the reason, he said, when wells are spudded but not started straight.

To level a rig often requires the rig-moving trucks, but by the time the derrick is up, they may be gone.

“Once the derrick is standing, it’s basically too late to level unless they have their own jacks.”

Having built-in jacks has become a much more common feature on new rigs. But even then, sometimes a rig leveller is needed.

“Twenty-fi ve per cent of the rigs I’ve done have their own jacks,” Johnson said.

“With their jacks, they can’t fi x the well bore alignments. Th ey can only fi x the level. I have rollers. I can move the rig in any direction I want.”

In one case the wa-ter truck had to empty the water tank, and the water tank and dog-house had to be moved 1.5 feet laterally before the substructure and the rest of the rig could be moved a similar dis-tance.

Being out of align-ment can cause wear on the casing, drilling string, cable, blocks, crown shivs and tongs, according to Johnson.

Typically it takes three to six hours to level a rig. Sometimes those calls come in at 2

a.m. “It all depends,” he said.

Th e longest job took 24 hours.

Th e rig leveling is done in addition to his other work, which is anything that will fi ll the fridge. Johnson has worked as a derrick hand, for instance.

Johnson has around 30 jacks, part of the setup he bought from Joe Carpenter, Terry Carpenter’s brother. Th at also include a three-ton picker truck.

Usually he’ll go out with an eight-jack setup capable of handling 200

tons. However, a triple will require a totally diff erent setup than a tele-double.

February is usu-

ally his busiest month. However, with the recent wet weather, he’s hoping business will pick up.

Keeping it on the level Ken Johnson specializes in rig leveling.


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Estevan – During the week, Riley Beatty sells fi breglass pipe with his father at Fibreglass Solutions in Estevan, but on the evenings and weekends, you’ll fi nd him cooking up a storm.

Riley Beatty owns and operates Estevans’ fi rst food truck, Th e Rolling Stove, with his wife Laura. On July 11

Pipeline News caught up to the Beattys at their usual Friday haunt, the Great Canadian Oil Change parking lot in the centre of Estevan.

A very pregnant Laura (due to de-liver their fi rst child in a couple days) had recruited her friend Stacey Fichter to help out taking orders, while Riley’s brother Sheldon

Beatty was helping out in the kitchen. A steady stream of hungry clients kept the orders coming.

One of those was Logan Gilliss of Gilliss Casing Services. He, his wife Dallas and son Bennett stopped to pick up supper.

“Yeah, it’s his turn to cook,” Dallas said of Logan.

“We ordered the

smoked cheesesteak,” Logan said. “Th ey have really good food. It’s unique in Estevan.”

Asked how she

got into the food truck business, Laura said, “I married him. It was his idea, but I went along with it, I guess.”

She’s a dental as-sistant at a local dental clinic, but has just started maternity leave.

“We bought the truck in October. We bought it from a guy in Moose Jaw,” she said.

During a brief lull in traffi c, Riley was able to hop out of the truck and chat.

“I sell fi breglass, in-side and outside sales,” he said. “I’ve been there for three years.”

In the past he’s worked at L&C Truck-ing, Steam Est, Badger Daylighting and almost every restaurant in Estevan.

“Every winter I go back to cooking,” he said.

Now 28 years old, he said, “I started washing dishes at 14 at the golf course, then Eddie’s.”

He kept moving up,

to prep cook and then cook.

“I went to Kelsey SIAST in Saskatoon. I took the professional cooking course in Sas-katoon,” he said.

While in Saskatoon he worked at a private club called Boffi ns in 2009 for a year.

As for what brought him back to Estevan, he said, “My dad was looking for help at Fibreglass Solu-tions.”

Riley and Laura have been married for two years. Riley said there was no question he was going to get a food truck.

“I do a massive amount of cooking and it to the satisfaction of everyone,” he said.

“I love making food, when people say, ‘It’s the best I’ve ever had.’”

“If we can feed people really good food, we’ll still get business. My motto is quality, not quanity.” Page B27



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Page B26To that end, he

would rather have fi ve or six things on the menu than 15. Th e menu keeps evolving, depending on what he can buy that week. If he can upgrade a cut of meat, he will.

“I like to switch it up,” Riley said. He’s still trying to see what the keepers are. Pulled pork is always popular, for instance.

A rink/ball dia-mond favourite is also a food truck favourite – the taco in a bag. But Riley does it a little diff erent from what you might fi nd in a rink.

“I sell more tacos

in a bag than anything else. It takes four to fi ve hours to smoke my meat.”

He preps enough food for three rushes. “If I sell out, I sell out,” he said.

“I do all my prep at home. For my meats, I smoke them at my house.”

A friend is welding up racks to take more equipment with the truck.

“I make everything from scratch. Every-thing on my menu comes from scratch.”

Only the breads are not home-made.

As for how often you can fi nd him, Riley

said, “I like to do one to two days a week. Ultimately I’d like to do three.

Th at usually means Friday nights at Th e Great Canadian Oil Change, and Saturdays downtown at Kal Tire.

How long in the season he can go de-pends on the tempera-ture. Basically, when the tanks on the truck start to freeze, that’s it. However, he can take the truck to shops for company Christmas parties for businesses that would rather host their function at their own facilities.

“I did the Boxing Day cabaret last year,”

he said. “I expect a busy December for Christ-mas parties.”

Th e Rolling Stove can operated through-out the Sun Country Health Region when it comes to food prepa-ration inspection, but local approvals are still needed for various towns. He has permis-sion to operated in Es-tevan from any public parking area, or on pri-vate sites with permis-sion of the owner.

In July he had a ball tournament lined up, as well as the Beach Bash at Boundary Dam reservoir.


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Estevan – Th e carbon dioxide custody trans-fer station near the Boundary Dam Power Station needed a fence put up around it, so surveyors from Altus Geomatics’ Weyburn branch were called out.

Th is crew is made up of Blake Noga and Blake Benson. Noga is the crew chief, having worked 12 years in the fi eld. His brother-in-law, Benson is his helper. To top it off , Noga’s wife who is also Benson’s sister, Alea Noga, works in the offi ce as a draftsper-son.

Noga 29 got his start as a helper when he was 18 years old. Th ey were using a system known as the “Total Station,” until adopting GPS a few years later.

“We use GPS for 90 per cent of our work,” he said.

He was born in Maple Creek, and raised in Medicine Hat. Noga moved to Weyburn fi ve years ago.

“I started at Midwest Surveys and was there for six years, and now I’ve been with Altus for six years,” he said.

While based in Medicine Hat he worked all over Alberta, into British Columbia and Saskatchewan. “Th at was all small inch pipeline and leases. With Altus, it was a combination of big-inch pipeline,

oilfi eld and residential,” said Noga.“Th at’s why I moved to Weyburn. I am home

every night now. Weyburn’s kind of an anomaly, I guess. I was in Rainbow Lake, Estevan, B.C.”

A friend whose grandfather used to be a land surveyor in Medicine Hat. Noga was looking for a job, and that land surveyor off ered him a job right out of high school.

On this day, they started with a JSA, a job safety analysis, which is done for every job. Instead of paperwork, the analysis is down with an iPad. It has numerous checklists that have been compiled over time.

“In our app, we identify that we have all our nec-essary tools and safety equipment in our trucks. Most days we’re using quads and side-by-sides, so we have to make sure we have all our safety stuff – shovels, fi re extinguishers, stuff like that,” Noga said.

Task hazards include things like vehicle, animal, forestry, tool and equipment hazards.

Th e iPad is a great tool, he noted, but for larger jobs, sometimes physical paperwork is necessary. Th e usage of tablets has dramatically improved over 10 years ago.

Noga made the transition from help to crew chief in just a year-and-a-half. “It was unusual for a guy to get a crew that quick,” he said.

When the farmers have crops in, there’s a lot of walking, as opposed to using all-terrain machines.

For the last year Noga spent a lot of time work-ing on the CO2 line from Boundary Dam Power Station to the Weyburn Unit.

Benson, 21, went to school in Lethbridge for a year for geomatics engineering. He’s taking a course to get a certifi cate in surveying.

He joined his brother-in-law as helper with Altus Geomatics.

He’s enjoying the fi eld work. “Th ere’s a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day,” Benson said.

He enjoys driving the snowmobiles in the winter and side-by-sides in the summer.

Benson hopes to do this work for several years, but he would also like to return to the farm near Central Butte.

Brothers-in-law survey together

Blake Noga enters data into the data collector, which is



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Estevan – Th ey say there’s no escape from death or taxes, but in Canada, they should also include winter. Th us, no matter when you build your oilfi eld facility, eventually you are probably going to need to insulate it.

Kandrea Insulation was one of the exhibitors at the Estevan Energy Expo June 11-13. Kandrea’s Jason McMullen, director of operations; Chris Martel, sales and marketing manager; and Glen Mitchell, Estevan branch manager, spoke to Pipeline News about their off erings.

Kandrea has been in Estevan for about fi ve years. Its corporate offi ces are in Drayton Valley, Alta. Th ey have nine branches including Calgary, Edmonton, Drayton Valley, Red Deer, Whitecourt, Bonnyville, Fort Mc-Murray and Wabasca in Alberta and Estevan in Saskatchewan.

Th eir insulation services include hot and cold pipe equipment, pipe-line, tanks and vessels, stacks, steam and glycol tracing, boilers and breech-ing, utilidor, self-framing buildings, rigid framed buildings and sheet metal fabrication.

A key element in their work is the sandwich panels made up of aluminum with a layer of spray foam insulation inside. Th ese are used in utilidors and buildings constructed on skids. Some of those buildings

include compressors, motor controls, electrical, pump packs and the like. Th ese buildings are typically in an industrial setting.

Depending on the oil company’s urgency, these buildings may be as-sembled on the skid before it goes out, or on site.

Martel said, “We do erection on site, like a stick-built building.”

“Th e other two key services are insulation blankets and glycol heat trace.”

A heat trace is a heating element applied to the pipe or valve being in-sulated. Th is can be electrical (which Kandrea doesn’t do), steam or glycol.

Asked about electrical heat tracing, McMullen said they “stick to what you know,” and work with electricians who do that work.

Mitchell noted that in southeast Saskatchewan, much of the heat trac-ing is electrical.

Th e purpose of the insulation can be to keep an item hot or cold. Mitchell said, “Primarily, it is to keep it hot, plus provide personal protec-tion from hot piping burns.”

As of mid-June they have six people working out of Estevan. But by the end of June, Mitchell expected that number to be up to 12. By Sep-tember, they expect to have the crew up to 20.

Th e company has about 300

people across all its locations. “We’ll move them around where

the projects are as needed,” according to McMullen.

Probably 250 of those 300 people work in the fi eld.

When it gets really cold, that’s when steamer trucks see their busiest days. “You shouldn’t need a steamer if it’s properly heat traced and insu-lated,” McMullen said.

September to April is the busiest time for them. “When the slow fl ies, it really picks up,” Mitchell said.

Asked why a company would

delay installing insulation on a new facility, he noted that it’s possible doing it later switches the cost of insulation from a capital cost to an operational cost.

“Th is year is looking very good,” Mitchell said, adding they have opened the door to the potash indus-try.

Insulating is a red-seal journey-man trade. Martel noted, “We’re pret-ty involved with SAIT and NAIT.”

On Oct. 1, 2013, Kandrea imple-mented pre-access, pre-employment alcohol and drug testing.

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(Daily Oil Bulletin) Calgary – Recruitment programs targeting aboriginals will become increasingly relevant for Saskatchewan oil and gas companies as the province’s First Na-tions, Metis and Inuit population continues to grows in tandem with recruitment needs in the energy sector, says a Petroleum Human Resources Council report.

“I think there really is room for improve-ment, and I think it’s about missed opportu-

nities … or maybe it is just the time to seize the opportunities from all parties — industry and the First Nations/Aboriginal work-force,” Carla Campbell-Ott, executive director of the council (which is a division of Enform Canada), told the Daily Oil Bulletin.

According to HR Trends and Insights: Aboriginal Employ-ment in Saskatchewan’s Oil and Gas Industry, the most recent cen-sus numbers indicate aboriginals will repre-sent 21 to 24 per cent of Saskatchewan’s total

population by 2031, but that demographic currently comprise just 7.5 per cent of regional oil and gas industry workers.

The report suggests there will be as many as 3,450 direct job open-ings between 2012 and 2022, as conventional oil production in the province is expected to increase by 5.4 per cent between 2013 and 2018. Industry spending will also generate as many as 20,500 indirect jobs per year by 2022.

Since growth is occurring in a prov-ince that already has

the lowest unemploy-ment rate in Canada at 4.5 per cent (as of March 2014), aboriginal recruitment strategies must become an in-creasingly key focus for oil and gas companies, the report suggests.

Unfortunately, said Campbell-Ott, when it comes to developing a diversified workforce, the smaller companies that are prevalent in Saskatchewan often lack the necessary knowhow and time to put together effective strategies to engage aboriginals, which is in part simply due to the

nature of those compa-nies that predominantly exist in the province’s oil and gas sector.

“Most companies that operate in Sas-katchewan are not the large E&P companies. They’re service compa-nies, for the most part. Service companies … are on the later stage of workforce planning, because they are waiting for the E&P companies to make their plans, and so their planning cycle is short.”

Among those companies seizing the opportunities by proactively strategiz-

ing with aboriginal groups is CanElson Drilling Inc., which last year entered into a partnership with File Hills Qu’Appelle Tribal Council Developments Limited Partnership, whereby each party now owns a 50 per cent interest in an exist-ing drilling rig, with CanElson operating the rig as the general partner.

“The view is having a business relation-ship that is sustain-able and long-term, but further works hand-in-hand with the view to improve employment to benefit both parties,” Randy Hawkings, president and chief executive of-ficer at CanElson, told the DOB.

“(File Hills Qu’Appelle’s) strategy, as they have explained it to us, is to develop a long-term, sustainable business, with the po-tential for employment. They look at it from the perspective (of ) if there is ownership, then there is leverage in terms of bringing people to work. Just offering strict employment, in our experience, has not been as successful.”

According to Fed-eration of Saskatchewan Indian Nations(FSIN) Chief Perry Bellegarde, while the oil and gas sector is “somewhat successful” at tapping into the human resourc-es potential that lies within the province’s First Nations commu-nity, still much more could be done in this regard to the benefit of all concerned.

Page B33

Companies should seize HR opportunities by engaging Saskatchewan Aboriginals: report


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Page B32He said, “We all

know the statistics in Saskatchewan, where the fastest-growing popula-tion is First Nations. I always urge both public and private sectors to start investing in (First Nations) human capital, because skilled labour and the labour shortage is a huge issue not only in the oil and gas sector, but in a lot of sectors across Western Canada.”

A strategic in-vestment such as the partnership between CanElson and File Hills Qu’Appelle is an impor-tant action for companies to pursue in the present, and to ramp up for the future, Bellegarde added.

“What is your re-cruitment strategy, and if you do get First Nations men and women into your organization, how do you retain them? It all comes down to relation-ship building.”

Multiple hires, for example, are an impor-tant tool for capturing First Nations into a company, Bellegarde said, because it helps individuals to feel they “fit in” when there are other First Nations at a worksite. Further, he said, mentoring and cultural training are also impor-tant, as are many other measures.

“What we keep pushing for in both the public and private sec-tors (is this): Have you embraced a First Na-tions and Métis strategy within your organiza-tion? Have you embraced getting the business case done?”

Among the cultural differences that com-panies might want to consider when trying to recruit from aboriginal groups in Saskatchewan, Campbell-Ott said, is that many First Nations have never really lived outside of their commu-nities.

“Support systems need to be put into place to assist with that, and that could be that there is an elder with a group, or that (aboriginals)

are hired in groups, or that transportation is managed for a group of people going to a place, and that there is a con-nection back to the com-munity with a telephone number to call.”

Development of essential employment skills is also important, Campbell-Ott said. Pre-employment is key to prepare new aboriginal workers for life on a rig, for instance.

In regards to cul-tural understanding, Bellegarde said there is a tremendous need for education and aware-ness within oil and gas companies, right up to the board and senior management level, as that will help in devis-ing strategies to hire and retain First Nations.

Hawkings said his company has learned from pursuing point ven-tures elsewhere in North America that a large amount of trust must be established prior to any business relationship from which employment opportunities might arise.

“You need to have experience in doing these sorts of things, we have seen. It takes a little bit of time and some effort to get that relationship established, but we think that the rewards long-term are well warranted in the time spent devel-oping the relationships.”

CanElson sees First Nations partnerships as providing opportunity to gain further access to an expanded labour force while also providing First Nations groups with op-portunity to participate in the economic upside of Saskatchewan’s oil and gas drilling business. The company intends to pursue such opportuni-ties with First Nations in situations where all par-ties involved can benefit, as in the current Sas-katchewan partnership.

Hawkings said: “We took the larger, global view that if we could get them out on a drilling rig and they could work on the rigs, some people

would find that rig work is for them, while for other people it is not, but let us get them out into the industry — bring them in and train them up. We started on the joint ventures.

“We are not drill-ing on the reserve lands, although in some cases we are drilling on tradi-tional lands where there is traditional trapping. Mainly the view was to do a business arrange-ment that allowed us to further enhance our chances of bringing more people into the industry of a First Nations back-ground.

“So we started with the File Hills Qu’Appelle, which represented quite a few First Nations. We have since expanded that and we are preparing to run a training program in Saskatchewan with a number of First Nations folks in order to bring them into the rigs. We did a project last winter with some out of Mani-toba, and it was very successful.

“We are looking ahead to the next one to five years, saying that we are going to need to bring more folks into the industry, because there is a lack of qualified people, bringing them onto the rigs to train them as part of the process in terms of our long-term strategy for people.”

For its part, Bel-legarde told the DOB, FSIN has worked towards building institu-tions for such purposes as educational and voca-tional training, with the expectation that enrol-ment with those institu-tions would be linked to jobs. However, he said, much more must still be done to ensure First Nations are fully partici-pating in the oil and gas sector, as well as other sectors of the Saskatch-ewan economy.

“Whose responsi-bility is it to do more? My response is that it is all our responsibilities. Federal government, provincial government, industry, First Nations governments — we must make sure our First Na-tions men and women get the skills and training they need, so they can compete and do a job in service.”

Bellegarde said it is key for industry and First Nations economic development corpora-tions to forge relation-ships, because it is not enough that companies have a representative workforce — First Na-

tions need a sense of ownership.

“There has been economic marginaliza-tion for far too long,” he said, adding the eco-nomic boom in Western Canada would ring much louder if First Nations are allowed to become a full part in it.

“It is a positive thing when you can look at equity ownership and it is a positive thing when you can look at partner-ships. It is a positive thing when you get more and more First Nations employed at all levels in a company.”

During the re-cent Tamarack Strate-

gies Canadian Energy and Environment Round Table, Phil Fontaine, former national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, said both in-dustry and First Nations must try and learn about each other, and engage each other in an effective manner in order to op-timally develop resources.

At the same time, industry must work with First Nations to guaran-tee a prosperous future for Canada’s energy sector, Fontaine told the forum, and aboriginals must be open to working with industry in order to guarantee their prosper-ity.


Estevan – Customization is the name of the game for Primex Training Centre, one of the companies who had a booth at the Estevan Energy Expo in June.

The company is based in Regina, and has an office in Gull Lake. Now

they are spreading their wings into southeast Saskatchewan. The company is considering establishing an Estevan office.

Partners Scott MacDonald, John Horstman were present at the Expo.“We have about 20 instructors we call on as needed. All work is contract,

as needed,” said Horstman.Noting they have 75 different courses, MacDonald said, “We offer every-

thing from oil and gas to mining, and construction. Those are the big three.”They also cover training for warehouses and industry.“The company started in 2007. It has taken off, and grown at a phenom-

enal rate ever since,” said Horstman, president of the firm.“Our business has really grown in the last year,” added MacDonald.They have done a lot of work at the Regina Global Transportation Hub,

for instance.Horstman was a highway traffic officer by trade. He hung up his weigh

scales in 2007. He’s the transportation specialist and administration arm. “After I left government, I was unemployed. I needed to supplement my

retirement. I made a list of my strengths and skills. That’s what brought me to instruct safety.

“The company is young, but the roots of the company go back 30 years in the safety industry,” he said. Page B35

Use their site, their equipment for training: Primex


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Carnduff – When your town’s sewage lift station is being over-whelmed, it sure helps to have vac trucks in town.

Jason Hollinger is deputy mayor of Carn-duff, as well as finance and HSE co-ordinator with Carnduff-based Competition Environ-mental.

“The town of Carn-duff phoned us at 1 p.m. on Saturday ( June 29). We were at the lift sta-tion steady until July 3, at least,” he said.

“We were sucking it off and dumping it at a manhole cover closer to the lagoon,” he said.

A lot of people’s

home sump pumps dis-charge their water into the town’s sewer system.

“The oilpatch was unbelievable,” Hollinger said of the response to the flooding, listing several local businesses who helped out.

“Companies in the area offered employees and help.”

They got offers of help from as far as Saskatoon.

Carnduff, as a whole was able to get by with-out too much damage after several roads were cut to allow water to flow.

Dennis Day, general manager of Fast Truck-ing and sister company

of Competition, said, “Our vac trucks were steady around the clock at the lift station.”

Rig moving, Fast’s specialty, came to a halt. “There was nothing to move. The roads were flooded. You couldn’t move from Carievale to Carnduff to get to work,” he said.

When the rain hit, there was six inches of water outside of his own house. “It can’t rain this much, I thought, but obviously it can,” he said

Two-and-a-half weeks later, rigs were moving again. “We moved nine rigs on Monday ( July 14),” Day added.

Helped having vac trucks around

Page B34

MacDonald looks after sales and marketing. He’s also an instructor for oil and gas, power mobile equipment, H2S, CPR and TDG.

The third partner is a subject matter expert who works on course development and Certificate of Recognition audits. He’s an Enform licensed auditor. “He’s the brains of the company,” Horstman said.

MacDonald said, “We’ve taken a bit of a different slant. Customer

service is first.”“We thought, there’s three things

that are important to us. No. 1, in-dustry knowledge is very important. Courses are up to date, with the most recent regulations.

“No. 2, we develop a relationship with our clients. They’re not a face-less name. We make frequent visits. I know their business.”

MacDonald said he put 45,000 kilometres on his truck last year to that end. “The feedback is great. They love the fact I come by.

“No. 3, the big difference is our flexibility. When they need it, on their site, on their equipment, that’s what we focus on.”

Many safety training companies have their own classroom facilities. That runs counter to Primex’s strat-egy. MacDonald said, “We found not having a classroom provides more flexibility, and no overhead.”

“We’re using their equipment, on their site.”

They have their own confined space simulator, but a trailer is not always realistic. Primex prefers to use the company’s own equipment and environment instead for training.

“Customization is big, i.e. the hours of service course. If you’re a fed-eral carrier, we teach you federal hours of service,” Horstman said.

McDonald added, “I’ve taught many overnight courses,” referring to

training for crews on night shift.“There’s no such thing as ‘no.’

Anything’s possible.”Horstman added they don’t gouge

desperate clients who need a training solution right away. They also don’t have course minimums.

They offer discounts on larger groups.

“I’ve taught courses to one guy,” MacDonald said.

“It’s cheesy, but we love what we do. We love teaching. We love dealing with our clients.”

Horstman spoke of one student who helped save someone from a heart attack with an AED.

“If I can keep someone from get-ting hurt, from dying, that’s reward in itself,” he said.

MacDonald added they do a lot of work for community organizations free of charge.


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Calgary – Commis-sioning is underway on the newly twinned 512 mile Seaway crude oil pipeline from Cushing Oklahoma to the Jones Creek storage and terminal facility near Freeport, Texas.

Th e new 30-inch Seaway loop built by Enbridge Inc. and its joint venture partner

Enterprise Products Partners is expected to more than double the capacity of the Seaway system to 850,000 bar-rels per day.

Th e twinned pipe-line, owned by Seaway Crude Pipeline Com-pany LLC comprising the joint venture part-ners was mechanically completed on July 3.

Th e Jones Creek facility is connected to Enterprise’s ECHO crude oil storage facility in Houston by a 65-mile, 36-inch pipeline.

Construction of a 100-mile, 30-inch pipe-line from ECHO to Beaumont/Port Arthur, Texas, is expected to be completed before the end of July.

Commissioning of the Seaway loop as well as the new ECHO to Beaumont/Port Arthur pipeline will continue throughout the third quarter 2014.

Enbridge purchased its 50 per cent owner-ship in the Seaway crude pipeline system from ConocoPhillips for US$1.15 billion in Nov. 2011.

Enterprise and Enbridge completed a project to reverse the fl ow direction of the Seaway pipeline in May 2012.

Th e reversal al-lowed Seaway Crude to transport crude oil from the bottlenecked Cushing hub to the vast refi nery complex along the Gulf Coast near Houston.

Commissioning underway

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NewsPiPeliNe seCTiON C

August 2014

Pipeline News was 2 sections this month.

stay tuned for next month focus: Crude-By-Rail

pipeline news august 2014

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