China Petrochemical Corp, the parent company of Sinopec, and a Canadian company yesterday announced the refiner will pay 105 million Canadian dollars (US$84 million) for a stake in Canada's Northern Lights oil sands project.

SinoCanada, a subsidiary of the Sinopec Group, sealed a series of agreements with Canada-based Synenco Energy Inc to buy 40 percent of the project located in the Athabasca region of Northeast Canada's Alberta Province, according to a Sinopec statement.

Synenco owns the remaining 60 percent share, and will operate the project as the managing partner, it said.

Oil sands are composed of sand, bitumen, mineral rich clays and water. Bitumen, after upgrading, can be used to produce a light crude oil.

The 4.5 billion Canadian dollar (US$3.6 billion) Northern Lights project, which includes oil sands mining and bitumen extraction, has a production capacity of 100,000 barrels a day of synthetic crude oil or 5 million tons annually, the statement said.

Synenco was established in 1999 to evaluate land in the Athabasca oil sands region. From 2003, the company started preparatory work on plans to develop the Northern Lights project.

"Sinopec is committed to the long-term development of the project in Canada, and we are very pleased to be a partner in its evolution," said Mou Shuling, chairman of the board of directors, Sinopec International Petroleum Exploration and Production Corp.

(China Daily June 1, 2005)