Alberta Courts Japanese Refiners For Heavy Oil Unit

Alberta Courts Japanese Refiners For Heavy Oil Unit

Alberta has opened early-stage talks with Japanese refiners to co-fund a coker that can run oil-sands heavy crude, aiming to support flows on the 890,000 bpd Trans Mountain system. A Japanese coker would raise domestic capacity to process heavy, high-sulfur crude. Most refineries in the region cannot run Canadian blends today, however Pacific-bound Canadian barrels would also lessen Japan’s exposure to South China Sea chokepoints. Alberta's gov…