The heads of major energy companies met with the premier to determine when and how operations can resume.
For more than a week, all anyone has been worried about was getting people out of the Fort McMurray area. Now, they need to get them back in.
“North of Fort McMurray itself, they were affected by smoke but not the fire,” said Steve Williams, CEO of Suncor. “So they’re in a condition where they’re either started up or in the process of moving back, and there you're thinking of days and maybe a week or so but you’re not talking longer periods. South where there have been a few more direct impacts from the fire we have to go in and evaluate.”
That was a common sentiment among leaders of Alberta’s major oil companies as they met with the premier to talk about restarting production, which virtually shut down during the crisis. Fortunately most sites were undamaged by the blaze and the companies say they don’t anticipate any layoffs as a result of the shutdown. They are also guaranteeing the wages of workers who were forced to flee. However, no one is sure when things will fully return to normal.
“So much of it is determined by the timeline of when they come back and the rate at which they get back to their previous rate of production, we know as things stand now the majority of production has stopped,” said Premier Rachel Notley in a press conference with energy company leaders. She said the province will work closely with producers to make sure pipelines and electricity grids are intact and routes are open as soon as it’s safe to do so.
Oil production is down by a million barrels per day, and the longer operations are offline, the more it will cost the province. But it won’t face it alone.
“This is our community, this where we live,” said Williams. “We've been here for the last 50 years we plan to be here the next 50 so you will see us working hard to rebuild Fort McMurray.”
About a dozen oilsands projects have been idled because of the fire.
