Crescent Point -- Joins The CBR Crowd in Canada -- Rail Beats Pipeline By $5/Bbl

The Calgary Herald is reporting:

Fast-growing intermediate oil producer Crescent Point Energy Corp. is moving nearly a third of its crude oil production by rail and plans to do more, it revealed Thursday.

On a conference call to discuss its first-quarter results, president and chief executive Scott Saxberg said the company moved an average of 31,500 barrels per day to market by rail in the first three months of the year using two loading facilities in Saskatchewan and another in Alberta.

Near mid-year, it plans to open its own rail loading facility in Utah to initially move about 5,000 bpd of oil from the Uinta Basin assets it bought late last year. It is currently moving 1,000 of its 9,000 bpd output through a third-party rail facility.

“On the rail front, we continue to increase the amount of crude we ship through our facilities in Saskatchewan and Alberta, which has given us access to new markets and reduced our exposure to crude oil price differentials,” Saxberg said.

Trent Stangl, vice-president of marketing, said the net benefit of moving crude by rail varies widely but has been $5 to $6 per barrel better than pipeline so far.

Crescent Point CBR was mentioned at the blog earlier.