RE: The JV with Valkor18 Jul 2020 20:01
SHERMAN OAKS, Calif., Oct. 29, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Petroteq Energy Inc. (“Petroteq” or the “Company”) (TSXV:PQE; OTC:PQEFF; FSE: PQCF), an oil sands mining and production company having a proprietary technology that extracts hydrocarbons from oil sands without the use of water, is pleased to announce that the Company has achieved sales of high quality heavy oil from its Asphalt Ridge facility in Utah.
Three important characteristics in comparing the qualities of different crude oils are specific gravity (API gravity), the amount of base sediment and water (BS&W), and sulfur content. West Texas Intermediate crude oil (WTI) is perhaps the leading benchmark crude oil used in North America for pricing different crude oils, primarily because it has a relatively high specific gravity (between 37 and 42 degrees on the API scale), a fairly strict maximum BS&W content (< 1.0%), and a low sulfur content (0.42% or less by weight). Crude oils having a relatively low content are considered “sweet” while oil having a higher sulfur content are considered “sour”. Crude oils having characteristics or specifications that are comparable with WTI crude oil are often in demand by refiners and yield a higher price than crude oils having lower quality characteristics.
Using oil sands ores mined or extracted from Utah’s Asphalt Ridge area, the Company has the ability – at its Asphalt Ridge facility – to produce a crude oil that can range between a heavier oil and a medium oil in its specific gravity (i.e. an API gravity of 11 to 30 degrees), depending on refiner crude slate requirements and the refined products (i.e. lighter gasolines, medium distillates such as diesel fuels, or heavier oil feedstocks) they plan to produce. In addition, even though the heavy oil and bitumen contained in Asphalt Ridge oil sands deposits have a relatively low sulfur content, the oil produced at the Company’s Asphalt Ridge facility has an even lower sulfur content when compared with WTI crude oil. Finally, the oil produced from the Company’s facility now yields a BS&W content of about .003%, a spec that is almost 40% lower than the BS&W specification required by many of Utah’s refiners, pipelines and custody transfer operations.
Crude oil produced at the Company’s facility in Asphalt Ridge is considered a sweet medium to heavy crude oil since the sulfur content is typically below the spec for WTI, has very low BS&W, and can be customized to achieve a range of API gravities. Throughout the oil industry, the shift over the past three or so decades to cleaner fuels, particularly in the U.S., has made a low sulfur content the “silver bullet” in how crude oil is valued and priced and its use as a feedstock in refineries that are now producing low sulfur or ultra-low sulfur gasolines and diesel fuels to meet increasingly stringent environmental requirements for both on-road motor vehicles and (more recently) the international marine industry.