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Tuesday, 02 December, 2008, 02:20 GMT | more >>

Horizon costs take another hike



By Upstream staff 

Canadian Natural Resources today said that costs at the Horizon oil sands project are set to rise between 8% and 14% over the original C$6.8 billion (US$7.1 billion) estimate following a number of operational delays.

The cost increase of up to C$952 million over the original budget compared to the company's May cost expectations for the first phase of the Horizon project to be in the range of 5% to 12%.

But Canadian Natural said the project was still in position to be more than 90% complete by the end of the year and that it remained on track for first oil in the third quarter next year.

"Progress in the third quarter of 2007 did slip against our baseline as a result of distractions resulting from Alberta-wide labour negotiations that occurred throughout the summer," Real Doucet, Canadian Natural's senior vice-president, oil sands, said in a statement.

"These challenges appear to be behind the Horizon project and our contractors current workforce of 8700 people are focused on completing as much work as possible before winter."

Engineering work is "substantially" complete at the northern Alberta project, a 110,000 barrel per day development, and construction is 76% finished, Canadian Natural said.


Wednesday, 31 October, 2007, 13:30 GMT  | last updated: Wednesday, 31 October, 2007, 13:31 GMT

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