Cold Lake Oil Sands – The Next Fort McMurray?

The Cold Lake region offers some of the best economics for oil sands development due to high bitumen quality and proximity to markets and infrastructure. Cold Lake’s thermal in-situ projects are the largest in the world and supply about 10% of Canada’s daily oil production. Major employers in the area include Imperial Oil, Husky, CNRL, EnCana, and others.

Cold Lake is located about 300km east of Edmonton, Alberta on the border with Saskatchewan. Oilsands, the tar like oil soaked sand, also referred to as bitumen is located more than 400 meters below the surface. Extraction is achieved through enhanced recovery methods such as SAGD (steam-assisted gravity draining). SAGD uses steam injection to thin the heavy bitumen and enable it to flow to the surface through directional drilling from one site into up to 20 different directions covering several square kilometers. This method enables a far smaller footprint compared to open pit mining, such as is used extensively in Fort McMurray. Over the past 40 years, the amount of fresh water required to produce a barrel of in-situ oil has been reduced by 88%. In some cases, steam is produced brackish saline water, eliminating fresh water use entirely. Approximately 95% of the produced water recovered with the oil is recycled.

When it comes to the facts of the job and housing market in terms of investment opportunities in Cold Lake, the Canadian Real Estate Magazine says that “Cold Lake is a hidden gem among Alberta’s larger, more prominent real estate markets”.  They also note “Cold Lake has the highest average rent in the province at $1,206 per month”. More interestingly, Alberta Energy states that one in 16 jobs in Alberta is directly related to energy. And the Financial Post reports that “residential prices shot up 14.5% last year and have risen another 5.6% year-to-date. Home prices have climbed more than 150% in a decade.” There is no doubt that this just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the investment opportunities that lay ahead for us in Cold Lake Alberta.

Therefore, due to high salaries, the outpour of job openings, and a housing and land boom, following Fort McMurray’s pattern in the 1990’s, we are well positioned to take advantage of the large land parcel our Kings Castle and PRISM A investors own on the northern end of the growing city of Cold Lake.

To see our upcoming Exclusive Land Development Opportunity Presentation, check out our events page.  Make sure to check our blog regularly as well because we’ll be updating you over the next few weeks about this exciting and lucrative project, including the as major progress we’ve made on this project over the last few months.