New technology could be a game-changer for Oil and Gas
Amanda Jeffery,
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
There are many who believe that the oil and gas industry has a short shelf life because it is a non-renewable resource, but one local company wants to change that perception.
Recover Inc. is a company that has developed technology that could potentially alter the playing field for the industry. They’ve built a plant near Lodgepole in the Western Economic Corridor that recycles drilling waste into base oil resulting in significant greenhouse gas reductions and now have a proven track record of success. All that’s holding them back from expansion is the perception of the industry in Canada.
Stan Ross, the CEO and president of Recover, says the facility first became operational in 2018. In 2019, they shut the plant down to clear the bottlenecking they were experiencing with the feedstock.
Since their restart in 2021, the plant has been fully operational and has had up to 12 rigs recycling their drilling mud through the plant. The benefit for these rigs is that sending their waste to Recover doesn’t cost them any money, whereas taking it to a landfill, which is the traditional way to dispose of drilling mud, does.
Recover makes their money from the sale of the recycled base oil, which Ross says is very similar to diesel fuel. Recycling the drilling mud, rather than disposing of it, prevents hundreds of greenhouse gas emissions from being released with each tank of the mud.
“We’ve made countless production records in the last 20 months,” says Ross. “Generally speaking things are going really well out there right now.”
He says the drilling activity this past year has been “fantastic” and the plant had to hold off their turn around until last June, and just finished it at the end of July.
Ross says he’s confident that Recover’s technology could change the game for the oil and gas industry. The possible reduction in greenhouse gas emissions alone could benefit the environment, but it could also show people that the oil and gas industry can evolve to achieve those reductions.
“The invert is used as a drilling fluid and the invert carries the rock particles, the drilling waste, out of the ground. Those rock particles are covered in the invert,” says Ross. “So what we’re taking is the actual drilling waste that is contaminated with invert. We wash the drilling waste and we recover the invert. In the process of recovering [the invert], we actually strip it back to base oil.”
When they first started up, they had plans to expand this project and had properties across the province. Since then, Recover has chosen to sell some of that real estate and isn’t quite sure what the future looks like for those properties.
The reason for the hesitance is a lack of investors.
“I think sometimes the truth just needs to be said. There has been so much damage to our industry coming out of the east that we cannot garner excitement for Canadian investment,” says Ross. “We need to raise capital in order to do projects, and we just can’t get capital providers interested in investing in Canada. It’s seen as an unsafe investment country.”
As a result, much of Recover’s business development has been focused south of the border.
Ross says the United States has developed an incentive program that is very attractive to investors. The Inflation Reduction Act was one that Ross says they’ve seen most recently.
“The investment opportunities south of the line is much different than it is in Canada,” says Ross. “The Inflation Reduction Act is what investment dollars are competing for and we simply don’t have a program like that that we can compete with in Canada.”
He says in the United States, diesel fuel is used for drilling, and since the base oil Recover produces is so similar, there is a market in the U.S. for the product.
“We are recovering a product in Canada which, following some very fine-tuned refining and hydro-treating, is recovered diesel fuel,” says Ross. “The carbon intensity of that fuel is truly spectacular.”
Ross says gasoline has a carbon intensity of about 100 grams of carbon per megajoule. Bio-fuels have an intensity of about 30 to 50 grams of carbon per megajoule, approximately half of the conventional fossil fuel energy source.
“Our carbon intensity is negative 190,” says Ross. “We’re doing that with a fossil fuel feedstock. This is spectacular technology we’ve got.”
Ross says he would like to see some kind of green credit initiative that could attract investors. Recover is starting discussions with the Province on how a program like that could benefit Canada, but it’s in the early stages.
Amanda Jeffery,
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Drayton Valley and District Free Press
