TORQ Transloading Inc., Calgary, plans a unit-train terminal in southwestern Saskatchewan able to accommodate rail movement of as much as 168,000 b/d of heavy oil and conventional crude.
The company is negotiating pipeline connections to the planned terminal in the Kerrobert area. The $100 million terminal served by Canadian Pacific Railway would be able to handle two, 120-car unit trains/day.
The terminal also would handle crude delivered by truck. It will have as much as 500,000 bbl of storage, including heated tanks for undiluted heavy crude.
According to government reports, Canadian National Railway Co. and Canadian Pacific recently were transporting about 120,000 b/d of Western Canadian crude oil, increasingly bitumen produced in Alberta, which must be diluted with light hydrocarbons.
The TORQ terminal will be able to handle undiluted heavy oil produced in the Lloydminister and Kerrobert areas.
“Kerrobert, Sask., is geographically as close to the heavy crude’s natural destination markets as possible by rail, minimizing transportation costs relative to similar crude types to be shipped by rail originating further north and west in Alberta,” said TORQ Chief Executive Officer Jarrett Zielinski.
“Our estimation is that the Kerrobert Rail Terminal could offer transportation savings to the US Gulf Coast and East Coast upwards of $5/bbl compared with shipping similar crudes by rail out of certain locations in Alberta.”
TORQ operates six crude-by-rail transload terminals in Alberta and Saskatchewan.
