Quebec’s National Assembly has approved legislation hailed by oil and gas companies as vital to tapping potential of unconventional reservoirs but resisted by environmentalists.
Bill 106 implements Quebec’s clean-energy plan and includes a section, the Petroleum Resources Act, providing for licensing of exploration and production.
Questerre Energy Corp., Calgary, which holds an interest in a deferred exploration project targeting the Utica shale in Quebec’s St. Lawrence Lowlands, welcomed the legislation (OGJ Online, Jan. 18, 2011).
Michael Binnion, president and chief executive officer, called it “a milestone for Quebec.” He said his company and others had lobbied more than 6 years for “a modern law to develop oil and gas.”
Greenpeace Canada spokesman Patrick Bonin called the legislation, passed after an overnight debate on Sept. 10, “obviously a way for the government to please the industry.”
Quebec has no marketable oil or gas production but holds potential in the Utica shale and other formations along the St. Lawrence River and on Anticosti Island.
In eastern Quebec, Junex Inc. of Quebec City recently ended an extended production test of its Galt No. 4 discovery well and has a permit to drill the Junex Galt No. 6 horizontal well (OGJ Online, Nov. 29, 2016).
