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These developments have led to a doubling of the discount that Canadian producers must accept for their barrels, as they miss out on the oil price rally. WTI prices have risen steadily over the past six months; the benchmark traded at US$57.16 per barrel Tuesday, while Brent crude prices also briefly surged to US$65 on fears of a pipeline disruption in the North Sea.

The discount between the two North American benchmark prices would remain wide over the next several years and average between US$13 and US$18 per barrel, after the discount was smaller at US$11 to US$12 per barrel earlier this year, according to Fitch Ratings.

The credit ratings agency said in a note Tuesday that the wider discount was a result of “the current lack of pipeline capacity out of Canada in the face of growing oilsands production and, after 2020, the phase out of high-sulfur fuel oil as a marine fuel, which is also expected to weigh on the WCS discount.”

The lack of available pipeline capacity came into sharp focus last month, when TransCanada Corp. shut down its Keystone pipeline system between Alberta and the U.S. Gulf Coast after a leak in South Dakota. The line is shipping oil again, but at reduced volumes.

“What that did is accelerate an issue that was going to happen in 2018,” Genscape crude oil analyst Mike Walls said, adding the widening in differentials between WCS and WTI had been forecast but the Keystone issue has moved the timing forward.