Shell Restarts Alberta Refinery

The energy giant Royal Dutch Shell will restart a unit of its energy refinery in Scotford Alberta near the town of Edmonton in Canada.

According to a message posted on a community information line on Saturday, there could be intermittent flaring over the next 48-hours but there would be no harm on material production.

Shell, which runs a 100,000 barrel-per-day refinery in Scotford in the province of Alberta, has increased its exploration for oil and development of its presence in the oil rich region, over the course of this year.

Oil Projects in Alberta

The oil company has a heavy presence in the oil rich state of Alberta and announced it would expand its activities there at the end of October this year.

On the 31 October 2013 the firm said it would continue with its Carmon Creek project in Alberta which is expected to produce up to 80,000 barrels of oils per day.

Shell submitted its regulatory application for the project in 2010 and received approval to move ahead with the project in April 2013 from the Alberta Energy Regulator.

Similarly, another major player in the oil business in Alberta, Suncor Energy, Canada's largest oil and gas company, announced a larger project in the Alberta region known as Fort Hills.

Suncor Energy and its partners will spend $12.9bn (£7.9bn, €9.5bn) on the Fort Hills project, which will involve the extraction of oil from tar sands in Western Canada.

The Calgary based company said its Fort Hills project would produce 180,000 barrels a day when becomes fully operational and have a lifespan of 50 years.

Suncor has a 40.8% stake in the project. Its partners are French oil company Total SA, has a 39.2% stake, and Canadian diversified miner Teck Resources has 20%.

Production is expected to begin in late 2017 and ramp up to 90% of capacity within 12 months.

Suncor Energy's, whose investment in Fort Hills will total about $5.2bn (£3.4bn, €4.0bn) and the company is already one of the largest oil sands operators in Alberta.