Pembina Institute | Waiting to Launch: 2024 mid-year update | 1 Introduction Since 2022, the Pembina Institute has produced a series of reports entitled Waiting to Launch: The gap between Canadian oilsands companies' climate pledges and actions.1 Since the last update in this series, twelve months ago, there have been important changes to the legislative landscape in Canada which are directly link. [...] The passage of the CCUS ITC was a crucial milestone, given that over the last three years, Canada’s oilsands companies have cited the finalization of the CCUS ITC as a key requirement for them to commence meaningful investments in decarbonization projects. [...] This is also despite the existence of a suite of publicly funded tools designed to support such investments, the finalization of which appears to have spurred other oil and gas companies to begin to move forward with their carbon capture projects in recent months. [...] Given the urgent need for a global shift to lower- carbon energy systems, and the importance of the oil and gas sector to Alberta’s economic stability and Canada’s export balance, we will continue to support these efforts to enable an orderly transition. [...] We respectfully acknowledge the space our organization is headquartered in as the traditional and ancestral territories of the Blackfoot Confederacy, comprised of the bands Siksika, Piikani, and Kainai, the Îyârhe Nakoda Nations, including the bands of Goodstoney, Chiniki, and Bearspaw, and the Tsuut’ina Dené.
Authors
- Pages
- 13
- Published in
- Canada
Table of Contents
- Canadian oilsands companies remained highly profitable in 2023 recording the second- 2
- These highly profitable years are now complemented by the completion of the Trans 2
- Mountain Expansion pipeline. Oilsands producers now have access to diversified export 2
- While the regulatory filings for the Pathways Alliance foundational CCUS project and 2
- Imperials deployment of its solvent-assisted Grand Rapids SAGD project were a step in the 2
- The Pembina Institute continues to support decarbonization efforts in the Canadian oil and 2
- Introduction 3
- Waiting to Launch 3
- The gap between Canadian oilsands companies climate pledges and actions 3
- Waiting to Launch 3
- Finances 4
- Oilsands producers remain highly profitable 4
- Waiting to Launch 4
- Figure 1. Profits of five of the largest oilsands producers in Alberta 4
- Capital expenditures are now being allocated to new production 5
- Free cash flow is being returned to shareholders at record rates 6
- Figure 2. Free cash flow generated by selected oilsands producers 6
- Emissions 7
- Oilsands absolute emissions continue to grow and modest progress on emissions intensity has stagnated 7
- Figure 3. Oil and gas sector emissions trajectory by sub-sector 8
- Figure 4. Oilsands emissions intensity by sub-sector 9
- Emissions reduction projects are not moving forward 9
- CCUS continues to move forward elsewhere as government supports are finalized 10
- Other emissions reduction activities are starting to develop but meaningful deployment still lags 12
- Conclusion 13