The Cold Lake oil sands are a large deposit of

oil sands Oil sands, tar sands, crude bitumen, or bituminous sands, are a type of unconventional petroleum deposit. Oil sands are either loose sands or partially consolidated sandstone containing a naturally occurring mixture of sand, clay, and wate ...

located near

Cold Lake, Alberta Cold Lake is a city in northeastern Alberta, Canada and is named after the lake nearby. Canadian Forces Base Cold Lake (CFB Cold Lake) is situated within the city's outer limits. History Cold Lake was first recorded on a 1790 map, by the nam ...

. Cold Lake is east of

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest T ...

's capital,

Edmonton Edmonton ( ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region. The city an ...

, near Alberta's border with

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...

, and a small portion of the Cold Lake field lies in Saskatchewan. In 1980, a plant in Cold Lake was one of just two oil sands plants under construction in Alberta.Although not developed as quickly and extensively as originally envisioned, an

Imperial Oil Imperial Oil Limited (French: ''Compagnie Pétrolière Impériale Ltée'') is a Canadian petroleum company. It is Canada's second-biggest integrated oil company. It is majority owned by American oil company ExxonMobil with around 69.6 percent o ...

plant in Cold Lake became the largest ''

in situ ''In situ'' (; often not italicized in English) is a Latin phrase that translates literally to "on site" or "in position." It can mean "locally", "on site", "on the premises", or "in place" to describe where an event takes place and is used in ...

'' oil sands project constructed in Alberta during the 1980s. By 1991, its daily oil production was 90,000 barrels. Some of the oil sands in the Cold Lake deposit have a low enough density that they can be extracted through drilling, as opposed to mining.{{cite news, url=http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/Premium-Petroleum-Corp-Increases-Lands-Position-to-11520-Acres-PINK-SHEETS-PPTL-771517.htm, title=Premium Petroleum Corp. Increases Lands Position to 11,520 Acres, publisher= Premium Petroleum Corp, date=2007-09-19, accessdate=2010-06-22, quote=After 5 or 6 days the well was checked again, only to discover approximately {{convert, 250, m, ft, abbr=off, sp=us head of oil was present in the well bore - evidence that Oil Sands had been encountered, and that it was Flowing Oil Sands. In accordance with Alberta Energy's designation, the project is categorized Oil Sands; located in the southern part of the Cold Lake Oil Sands district.

References

Bituminous sands of Canada

See also

References