By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, July 19 -- Husky Energy Inc., Calgary, paid $6.6 million at a July 12 land sale for a 14,560-acre oil sands lease next to its Saleski property in Alberta. The purchase will add about 1.34 billion bbl of bitumen in place to existing holdings, for a total Saleski resource potential of 20.82 billion bbl of bitumen in place. It also will increase Saleski leases to 193,120 acres.
John C.S. Lau, Husky president and chief executive officer, said the company is preparing a feasibility development plan for the area. He added, "Including the Saleski oil sands leases, we estimate that the company's oil sands leases contain over 37.6 billion bbl of original bitumen in place."
The Saleski lease potential is in the Grosmont carbonate formation and has on average 250 m of overburden. During the 1970s and 1980s, Husky had carried out several pilot projects producing bitumen from carbonates.
Husky also completed a four-well evaluation program last winter on Saleski and plans to spend $25 million for resource evaluation wells at Saleski and at its Caribou Lake lease near Cold Lake (OGJ Online, Apr. 19, 2006).
