A new report says Canada has surpassed one gigawatt - a billion watts - of installed windpower capacity.
Ernst and Young Renewable Energy Group says Canada is the 12th country in the world to surpass the one-gigawatt threshold.
The report credits provincial support, noting that Quebec and Manitoba have set ambitious windpower targets.
But it says there is industry concern about the continued provision of incentives at the federal level, since the Conservative government has frozen funding for the Wind Power Production Incentive.
The report cites Canada as the seventh most attractive country for investment in wind power over the long term.
First on the list is the United States, which the report says is showing unprecedented support for climate-friendly policies.
Pengrowth Energy Trust (TSX:PGF.UN) is raising $400.9 million in equity financing to fund its $1.04-billion purchase price of four oil and gas properties from ConocoPhilips (NYSE:COP), the largest property acquisition by a Canadian royalty trust.
The deal is expected to increase Calgary-based Pengrowth's total production to about 100,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day.
The properties in Alberta and Saskatchewan were among the assets ConocoPhillips acquired in its takeover of Burlington Resources in March and had been for sale for months.
The deal was originally to have been announced the week that federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty stunned business by declaring on Halloween that the government was changing the favourable tax policy for income trusts.
In view of pending tax rule changes, chief executive officer Jim Kinnear said Pengrowth sought and obtained a "comfort letter" from the Department of Finance stating the acquisition would not be considered outside the scope of normal growth, because of the "advanced state" of the deal at the time of the minister's announcement.
Although the document also states its contents are not binding on the finance minister or Parliament, Kinnear said the trust believes it's reasonable to rely on the comfort letter.
Pengrowth also announced plans for a "comprehensive asset rationalization" of its entire portfolio with an eye to selling off about 7,700 barrels of oil equivalent of daily production and 25 million barrels of equivalent of proved plus probable reserves. This includes non-core properties and some of the assets included in the ConocoPhillips properties.
Pengrowth hopes to raise between $300 million and $400 million.
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty says a meeting with the energy industry hasn't changed his mind about taxing income trusts, but he's willing to discuss how the move will be carried out.
"They have my commitment that we'll have consultation," Flaherty said. "We'll try to get the guidelines, the implementation rules, out by Christmas time."
Flaherty emphasized that the overall principles won't change, and the government is determined to end the tax-free status of income trusts, barring some real-estate trusts, by 2011.
The energy industry has argued that it's a special case and deserves an exemption.
Flaherty said the energy executives he met with last week made their case in a "very frank and direct" manner.
The finance minister didn't budge on his own objectives but said he agrees that "we do have to have some rules about growth of income trusts, and so on, over the course of the next four years."
John Dielwart of the newly formed Coalition of Energy Trusts says the minister was generous with his time and the executives were able to convey their position.
Energy trusts have lost billions in value since Flaherty's announcement.
ConocoPhillips is preparing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to retrofit its refinery in Billings, Mont., to process crude oil from the oilsands of northern Alberta.
Company CEO Jim Mulva told the Billings Gazette in a story last week that the company is evaluating different technologies to handle the heavier crude, and that the company's board is expected to vote on the project early next year.
"We are studying both an expansion and a capability improvement at the Billings refinery," Mulva said. "That means our ability to handle tougher crudes, worse-quality crudes."
Mulva declined to discuss details of the project, except to say it is part of the company's 2007-08 overall business plan. The multi-year construction project would be significantly larger than the low-sulphur diesel conversion completed this year in Billings, whose cost has not been revealed.
ConocoPhillips announced in October it had agreed to a joint venture with Calgary-based oil and gas giant EnCana Corp. (TSX:ECA) that will give the Houston company a strong foothold in the highly coveted oilsands.
Talisman Energy Inc. (TSX:TLM) has sold non-core assets in northern Alberta for $582 million, including its share of the Syncrude oilsands partnership.
The move is part of Calgary-based Talisman's previously announced strategy to get out of the oilsands and focus on core production.
Canadian Oil Sands Ltd. (TSX:COS.UN) has signed a deal to acquire Talisman's 1.25-per-cent interest in the Syncrude partnership for $475 million, including $237.5 million in cash and about 8.2 million units of the income trust.
That transaction is conditional on clarification of how it could impact Canadian Oil Sands' tax status under proposed new federal legislation.
Several deals are on hold while energy trusts and exploration companies await clarification from Ottawa on the maximum size of acquisitions allowed under the federal plan to eliminate the tax-free status of existing income trusts in 2011.
Should the Talisman deal proceed, Canadian Oil Sands would increase its share of Syncrude to 36.74 per cent.
The transaction is expected to close on or before Feb. 28, 2007.
Talisman also agreed to sell its royalty on Suncor's Lease 23 to Suncor Energy Inc. (TSX:SU) for $107.5 million. Talisman said it is in talks to realize value from its remaining oilsands leases.
In recent months, Talisman has announced plans to sell off assets worth about $2.5 billion in Alberta and the North Sea.
The company intends to use cash proceeds from asset sales to repurchase its shares. So far in 2006, Talisman has repurchased about 24.8 million shares for $450 million.
Shell Canada (TSX:SHC) plans to raise spending almost 50 per cent to $4 billion in 2007, including $2.45 billion on oilsands projects.
The announcement followed by a few hours a similar forecast by Western Oil Sands, Shell's partner in the Athabasca Oil Sands Project. It plans to spend $715 million next year, with over 90 per cent - $655 million - sunk into the northern Alberta oilsands.
"This investment plan supports Shell Canada's growth in unconventional oil and gas while maintaining the leadership position of our oil products business," stated Clive Mather, CEO of the Canadian subsidiary of the Royal Dutch Shell PLC (NYSE:RDS.A).
A large portion of the oilsands funding will go toward increasing the Athabasca Oil Sands Project's production by 100,000 barrels per day, Shell said.
Shell owns 60 per cent of the operation, with Western Oil Sands and Chevron Canada (NYSE:CVX) each holding 20 per cent.
Of its spending in other areas, Shell has earmarked $1.1 billion for exploration and development and $470 million for its oil products division.
Shell Canada has said that after the first expansion of Athabasca, it will leave Western Oil Sands and Chevron to find their own upgrading solutions while it focuses on its own oilsands production.
The Alberta Ingenuity Centre for In Situ Energy has received $9,334,326 from the Canada Foundation for Innovation's Leading Edge Fund.
The money will be used for pilot projects to test new techniques for unlocking energy from Alberta's oilsands reserves using less energy and water, and reducing the environmental footprint of production by enhancing bitumen upgrading directly in the reservoir.
The centre is an initiative that includes Alberta Ingenuity, ISEEE, the Schulich School of Engineering, the U of C faculty of science and founding industry partner Shell International/Shell Canada Ltd.
A recent report says Albertans are not getting their fair share of money from the province's huge oil reserves.
The Pembina Institute study says in spite of record prices and production, the amount of energy royalties from oil has decreased by one-third over the past 10 years.
Pembina spokesman Marlo Raynolds said the royalty system designed years ago to spur activity in the oilpatch is outdated, and unfairly favours corporations over Alberta residents.
The report calls for Albertans to act like owners of the resource and demand a new royalty structure that better favours taxpayers.
It also calls on Ottawa to eliminate tax breaks to the industry.
- with files from Business Edge
