Imperial is a major developer of Canada's vast oil sands located in northeast Alberta, where the company holds a significant land position with about 465,000 acres of quality oil sands leases.

Kearl oil sands project

The Athabasca oil sands hold significant potential beyond the opportunities being pursued at Syncrude. Imperial Oil and ExxonMobil Canada , separate but affiliated companies, are developing a new oil sands mining opportunity in the Kearl Lake area, about 70 kilometres north of Fort McMurray , Alberta . The Kearl Oil Sands Project involves a phased development approach, with an initial development of about 110,000 barrels a day, slated for start-up in late 2012, and later expansions to as much as 345,000 a day by about 2020. Current plans do not include any on-site bitumen upgrading facilities for the initial phase of development, and the companies are evaluating a range of options for future development, including potential integration with North American refineries owned by Imperial and ExxonMobil.

Kearl represents one of the best undeveloped resources in terms of the quantity of bitumen that can be produced for a given volume of mined material, providing the project with an inherent cost advantage. Kearl will utilize proven technologies such as truck-and-shovel mining and hydrotransport, as well as newer ones, such as paraffinic froth treatment – a technology developed by the company that produces a higher-quality, marketable bitumen product.

The project has an estimated lifespan of about 40 years.

Career opportunities

Imperial Oil’s current and future operations are expected to provide significant long-term employment opportunities, requiring individuals with a diverse range of skills and qualifications

For instance, the potential Kearl project would call for us to add over 600 permanent positions over the next five years, many of which will be based on a fly-in, fly-out rotational shift operation.  We expect to look for mining engineers, process operators, equipment specialists, trade technicians, truck and shovel operators and maintenance planners.  We also anticipate that support will be required from other areas of the company, through professionals in our various corporate departments.

For more information about our company and its projects, visit our website: www.imperialoil.ca

Professionals New Graduates/Students Friday, May 04, 2012 Formation Evaluation / Petrophysical Specialist, Calgary, AB, Canada Thursday, April 26, 2012 Kearl – Business Analyst, Calgary, AB, Canada Kearl – Mine Operations Projects Lead, Calgary, AB, Canada Friday, April 20, 2012 Formation Evaluation / Petrophysical Specialist, Calgary,AB, Canada Friday, May 04, 2012 Drilling Engineering - university coop student, Calgary, AB, Canada Environmental Assistant - university coop student, Cold Lake AB, Canada Environmental Engineer/Remediation Project Assoc. - university student, Various Locations, Canada Minerals Processing Engineer - university coop student, Calgary, AB, Canada Mining Engineering - university coop student, Calgary, AB, Canada Operations Support Engineering - university coop student, Cold Lake, AB, Canada Programmatics Engineering - university coop student, Cold Lake, AB, Canada Project Engineering (WCMP) - university coop student, Calgary, AB, Canada Research Assistant (Geomechanics/Microseismic)-university coop student, Calgary, AB, Canada Water Resources Engineering - university coop student, Calgary, AB, Canada