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Image: Joey Podlubny/JWN CALGARY — Alberta is going in the “right direction” with its plan to ease production curtailments for oil producers who add crude-by-rail capacity, the CEO of Imperial Oil Ltd. said Friday, although he didn’t commit to transport more oil by rail. Rich Kruger — one of the industry’s most outspoken critics of mandatory curtailments that began in January — said it’s necessary to review of the details of the province’s plan, which was announced Thursday. “I would say, in the form of a compliment to the government, they’re trying to make the best of a bad situation. They’re playing the cards they were dealt,” he said on a webcast to discuss third-quarter results. “The bad situation is that we’re in curtailment in the first place.” Under the previous NDP government, Alberta put a cap on the amount of oil that the industry can produce as a way to narrow price discounts that grew as oil production exceeded the ability of pipelines to get the crude to market. The measure was continued by the United Conservative government, when it was elected last spring, but the industry quota is rising to 3.81 million barrels per day in December, […]
