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Alberta’s
energy resources are unique. Nowhere else in the world does such
a rich variety of natural resources – including conventional
oil, natural gas, heavy oil, oil sands, coal and coal bed methane
– exist in such abundance. Alberta’s Athabasca oil sands
alone contain more oil than Saudi Arabia’s vast desert.
ASRA
is committed to fostering the innovative environment necessary to
achieve all of these goals. Recognizing that 10 to 20 years are
required for such research and development to come to fruition,
ASRA knows Alberta must continue to create synergy among researchers
and processors over the long term. ASRA will also ensure that government
invests strategically throughout the research-development-commercialization
cycle. To that end, ASRA established the Alberta Energy Research
Institute (AERI) to carry on work started by the Alberta Oil Sands
Technology and Research Authority and become the unifying energy
research body for the province.
AERI’s
energy strategy has identified the following main goals:
- Develop
clean burning coal to generate electricity. Also, use
coal and other feedstocks to produce steam and hydrogen (for oil
sands recovery upgrading and fuel cells), and use concentrated
carbon dioxide streams to enhance conventional oil and gas recovery.
- Upgrade
oil sands technology to allow Alberta to enhance the
value obtained from bitumen and synthetic oil production, which
is expected to quadruple in the next 20 years.
- Manage
carbon dioxide and other emissions by developing technology
that will use waste carbon dioxide to recover more conventional
crude oil and to harvest natural gas from coal beds.
-
Improve oil and gas production
by investing in leading-edge research for improved recovery and
less energy-intensive production.
-
Develop an energy research infrastructure
to support the emerging fuel cell industry and the hydrogen economy.
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