Wildfires boost Canadian crude oil prices as Suncor cuts production

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Canadian heavy crude prices strengthened for a second day after Suncor Energy Inc. curtailed production at its Firebag oilsands site due to a nearby wildfire.

Western Canadian Select’s discount to the West Texas Intermediate benchmark narrowed to US$13.65 a barrel from US$14.70 on Thursday, according to General Index data posted on Bloomberg and a person familiar with prices.

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Suncor said late Thursday that it’s temporarily curtailing some production at Firebag because of a nearby wildfire. The blaze is about eight kilometres from the site and grew to about 12,000 hectares in size since Thursday. While the blaze showed “no significant” growth toward infrastructure, it did grow toward the east and showed “extreme fire behaviour,” Alberta Wildfire said in an update.

“Today will be another challenging day for firefighters,” the department said.

Firebag produced 231,000 barrels a day of crude in May, Alberta Energy Regulator data show. In addition to Firebag, the wildfire is within about 25 kilometres of two other major oilsands sites: Imperial Oil Ltd.’s Kearl mine and Cenovus Energy Inc.’s Sunrise well site.

Both companies said Thursday that production hasn’t been affected.

Bloomberg.com

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