Canadian oil producers beset by years of constrained pipeline capacity expect to garner better prices for their crude when the expanded Trans Mountain conduit starts up next year, opening them to new markets in Asia.
The expansion project — which Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government bought for C$4.5 billion ($3.3 billion) in 2018 — will reduce oil-sands producers’ dependence on US refiners that currently forces them to accept discounted prices for their crude. Coming a little more than two years after the 2021 startup of Enbridge Inc.’s Line 3, the Trans Mountain expansion has — at least temporarily — removed pipelines from the list of a concerns for an industry long hampered by limited shipping options.
