Former Microsoft Man Tackles New Venture In Groundbreaking Technology In The Oil And Gas Sector

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VANCOUVER – Parminder Singh,President of Intellectual VenturesCanada, and former Managing Directorof Microsoft Canada’s DevelopmentCentre, is the Chairman of a local companywhich is striving to help the oil andgas industry clean up its harmful environmentalpractices while adding to theproducer’s bottom line.Parminder Singh joined founding directorsChand Jagpal and Gurdeep Johal,who established ME Resource Corp.back in 2009, early this year.ME Resource Corp. is a publically tradedcompany and has its sights set on supplyingthis innovative technology to the oiland gas industry in North America,Middle East and Asia.These three local entrepreneurs are lookingto change the landscape for oil andgas operators and producers and potentiallyhelp reduce the emissions of amuch publicized polluting industry.How is this possible?Well, first the economic conditions areright. Natural gas was recently valued atan all-time low, hovering around the$3.50 MMBtu mark. New reserves ofnatural gas flooded the market in 2008sending prices well below the $6 MMBtuprice which is the average price needed tocover all the costs over a well’s life cycle.The difficult financial position of the gasproducers was made more complex as acombination of new governmental andbanking regulations requires operators topost increased financial security to preventany costs from being passed on tothe taxpayers.Secondly, the industry isgenuinely eager to improve its practiceswhich are very wasteful and emits significantamounts of harmful greenhousegases (GHG) into the atmosphere.Operators and produces simply burn orflare any excess raw natural gas for whichthere is no pipeline infrastructure ormeans of storage. This results in enormousamounts of polluting GHG beingreleased and with it comes notable effectson human health. The World Bank statesthat over 150 billion cubic meters ofGHG are being flared annually worldwide.That is equivalent to 25% of theannual gas consumption of the UnitedStates. Financially, that’s $50 billion literallygoing up in smoke.Why flare this natural gas? At $4 aMMBtu it just wasn’t worth the addedcapital costs to add infrastructure or tieinto a pipeline; after all the real money isthe $100/barrel oil.Through extensive experience with technologydevelopment and the resourceindustry the local entrepreneurs recognizedthis opportunity in 2011. So theyset out piecing together a world-classteam of industry leaders with expertizeranging from chemical engineering, catalysis,technology development, publiccompanies, manufacturing, and oil andgas extraction.With a current research program headedby Professor Gregory Patience, P.Eng,PhD from École Polytechnique deMontréal, a patent pending technologysolution was designed which would beunique in the industry in that its overallsize, capacity to manage gases, lifetime ofoperations, modularity to integrate withexisting infrastructure, and transportabilityprovides a real solution to companiesboth big and small. The solution, oncecommercialized, will simultaneouslyaddress the harmful GHG emissionsfrom flaring, and add revenue streams foroperators by processing the wasted naturalgas, including substantial amounts ofstranded gas, into Engineered Fuels™,including diesel, diluents and other valuableend-products as demanded by industry.Singh, Jagpal and Johal, in partnershipwith École Polytechnique deMontréal, are developing this gas-to-liquidstechnology so that an economicsolution with micro-applications can bepresented to industry. A solution whichwould be made in Canada and createlocal highly skilled jobs.ME Resource Corp. is successfully progressingtowards commercializing thispatented technology, which will make useof this wasted natural gas, to produceupto 10 barrels of Engineered Fuels™per day and generate 30kW of continuouspower from a fuel feed of 100Mcf.Natural gas, worth $4 a MMBtu or $23 abarrel equivalent, can now be processedand sold for close to $100 bbl/day basedon the today’s value of EngineeredFuels™. The novel technology integratedraw natural gas conditioners, compressors,2 – 3 phase separators with asingle-vessel partial oxidation and fischertropsch processor. Another uniqueaspect was a flexible design, whichenabled operators to use existing equipmentin place and just plug-in therequired module, including a remotepower generation unit. On November5th 2013 the company presented to theoil and gas industry at the PetroleumTechnology Alliance Canada in Calgary(www.ptac.org). Parminder Singh wasjoined by the company’s other directorsDr. Michael Raymont, former presidentof the National Research Council ofCanada, and Professor Patience. MEResource Corp. has had a tremendousresponse from those in attendanceincluding industry leaders, Suncor, HuskyEnergy and Devon Energy.When asked “What’s next for MEResource Corp.?”Parminder Singh stated, “We have globalapplications and ambitions.”For more information on ME Resource Corp.please visit www.meresourcecorp.com