Article content

One unforeseen advantage has emerged from the foreign exodus from the oilsands — there is a new alignment of interests between industry and Canadian governments to help them succeed.

That’s the view of Steve Williams, president and CEO of Suncor Energy Inc., Canada’s largest oil and gas company, who started the Canadian consolidation trend last year by acquiring a control position in competitor Syncrude Canada Ltd. Other major deals followed — including the purchase of Royal Dutch Shell PLC’s oilsands assets by Canadian Natural Resources Ltd., and the purchase of ConocoPhillips’ oilsands assets by Cenovus Energy Inc.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Oilsands Canadianization has aligned interests, says Suncor Energy CEO Steve Williams Back to video

Canadian companies are now in charge of about 70 per cent of oilsands production, and some have become so large they are giants of the Canadian economy. (Among the producers, Suncor has a market value of about $70 billion and Canadian Natural of $50 billion; in the pipeline group, Enbridge Inc. has a market value of about $90 billion and TransCanada Corp. of about $55 billion).