Abasand

The Abasand Oils Ltd. plant was the second oil sands separation facility to be developed by private industry. It was located on the Horse River, just south of Fort McMurray, and had a short but eventful history.

It all began in 1929, when Max Ball contacted Karl Clark to discuss the oil sands. In 1930, Ball and J. M. McClave toured the Research Council of Alberta’s oil sands separation plant on the Clearwater River on behalf of their company, Canadian Northern Oil-Sand Products Ltd. (renamed Abasand Oils Ltd. in 1935). Clark was their guide. Ball must have been impressed, since he negotiated to purchase the plant and rights to the adjacent oil sands quarry developed by Sidney Ells. Times were tough in the early 1930s, however, and Ball could not raise the money required for the purchase. So, he commenced plans for a completely new plant, using the McClave hot water separation process, to be located a short distance away.

The site Ball chose was on the federal government’s Horse River Reserve, where thick deposits of high-grade oil

sands are located close to the surface. While Ball continued fundraising, McClave worked on his separation process. According to Clark, some of McClave’s improvements were inspired by the Clearwater River plant. Finally, in 1936, the plant was completed. It soon encountered technical difficulties, not least of which was the presence of excessive amounts of sand in the separated oil.

Abasand Oils Ltd. also had to deal with another major challenge. The deposit at Horse River is hard, very abrasive, and has pieces of pyrite and flint rocks in it. Quarrying machinery was constantly breaking, having been worn down by the sand or broken by the rocks. The practical solution was the use of explosives to loosen the sand in the quarry.

Despite the difficulties, the plant successfully produced quantities of gasoline, diesel oil and fuel oil. In November 1941, disaster struck when fire destroyed the plant. Undaunted, Abasand Oils Ltd. rebuilt, and within a year had the plant running once again.

Meanwhile, World War II was dragging on, and the Canadian government was looking for a source of petroleum products. Abasand and the vast oil sands deposit looked like a good prospect. In 1943, the federal government took control of the plant. Abasand Oils Ltd. was paid only one dollar in compensation, but was promised that an improved facility would be returned to the company when the war ended.

After an evaluation of the plant by a consultant, it was decided to install a new separation process using cooler water. Heating the water used a lot of energy, energy that the plant was wasting because the water was not re-circulated. Despite a generous budget, work at the site progressed slowly. Controversy surrounded the project because of the way it was being managed.

In spring 1945, another fire completely destroyed the plant. The fire was said to have been caused by a welder’s torch. Clark theorized that the combination of open separation tanks and the use of large amounts of kerosene as a diluent to aid in settling sand and floating the oil resulted in a concentration of volatile hydrocarbons in the air. In addition, some of the buildings were at least partially constructed of wood, which had become saturated with oil. All in all, it was a situation ripe for combustion. The plant was not rebuilt, in spite of the federal government’s promises to Abasand Oils Ltd. before the takeover.

By 1948 the remains of the plant had been sold off. Today, little remains to indicate the presence of a historic industrial installation.