Tapping into market for low sulphur fuel oil

How it’s doing

 () is currently working with the joint venture partner Valkor to finalise planned upgrades and a proposed work programme to the Petroteq Energy existing oil sands plant (POSP) at Asphalt Ridge in Utah.

The process under development would produce a low sulphur fuel oil product that could be sold directly into the market place as bunker fuel for shipping, rather than being sold as a crude product to refineries.

Greenfield venture

In January, Tomco confirmed that the Petroteq oil sands plant (POSP) at Asphalt Ridge is operating and producing oil at the anticipated volumes and quality, with no issues to date.

As of January 19, 2021, the plant had produced over 100 barrels of oil. TomCo noted that the intention is to increase test production to approximately 250 barrels of oil per 12-hour shift.

The trial project kicked off earlier this month and presently the operations are being optimised.

What the boss says

“We are very pleased with the POSP operations and initial oil production,” said John Potter, TomCo chief executive in a statement.

“The planned test work and third-party engineering analysis is also underway as we work on further optimising the POSP and increasing production. We look forward to reporting on our continuing progress in the coming weeks.”

What the analyst says: Ed Stacey, Proactive Research 

Aside from the ready-for-market output product, the separation system has other unique advantages compared with existing oil sands separation technologies, including:

• Limited environmental impact, with a modest water requirement, and no “dirty” sand to remediate at the end of the process
• A scalable modular system with limited capex requirement
• Read the full note here

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