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ABMI releases first report on biodiversity in Athabasca Oil Sands Area

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The Alberta Biodiversity Monitoring Institute (ABMI) released the first comprehensive report on the status of Alberta’s species in the Athabasca Oil Sands Area (AOSA). It also contains the Athabasca oil sands deposit, which represents 77% of Canada’s proven oil reserves and supports a growing energy extraction sector. “

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Average carbon intensity of oil sands production has dropped ~36% in last 40 years; still 12-24% higher than conventional oil CI

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The carbon intensity (CI) of Alberta oil sands production has significantly decreased over the last 40 years, according to a new study by a team from Stanford University published as an open access paper in the journal Environmental Research Letters. Supplementary Information. System boundary for mining & upgrading pathway.

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Canada introduces new integrated plan for oil sands monitoring

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Summary of the current oil sands developments (mining and in-situ) and associated land use. Canada’s Environment Minister Peter Kent released an integrated monitoring plan for the oil sands region. fail in its goal of generating the data necessary to provide assurance that the oil sands are.

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New study finds GHG emissions from palm oil production significantly underestimated; palm oil biofuels could be more climate-damaging than oil sands fuels

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Mha (20%) of the peatlands of Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra and Borneo in 2010, surpassing the area of Belgium and causing an annual carbon emission from peat decomposition of 230–310 Mt CO 2 e. Slightly more than half of the GHG emissions for these biofuels in the EPA’s analysis came from land use change. Earlier post.). —Dr.

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Study finds plausibly high volumes of Canadian oil sands crudes in US refineries in 2025 would lead to modest increases in refinery CO2 emissions

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An analysis of the US refining sector, based on linear programming (LP) modeling, finds that refining plausibly high volumes of Canadian oil sands crudes in US refineries in 2025 would lead to a modest increase in refinery CO 2 emissions (ranging between 5.4% to 9.3%) from a 2010 baseline, depending upon the supply scenario.

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Chevron leveraging information technology to optimize thermal production of heavy oil with increased recovery and reduced costs

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Chevron’s focus on optimizing the thermal management of the Kern River field has resulted in a steady drop in the steam:oil ratio (barrels steam water per barrel oil), resulting in improved economics of the field even with slowly declining production. Data: California DOGGR. Click to enlarge. Source: Chevron. Click to enlarge.

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US State Department to hold 6 additional public meetings on Keystone XL oil sands pipeline

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Keystone XL is a proposed 1,700-mile oil pipeline from the US-Canadian border in Montana, through Cushing, Oklahoma, to refineries on the US Gulf Coast. In April 2010, the State Department released a Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for public comment. Earlier post.).

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