RE: Just wait and see B.C and FlatlandTell that to my oil service buddies who operate co.s out of Nisku. Practically the day after the royalty announcement a couple years ago they lost half their business. Contracts were being cancelled left and right. I know several who have acre upon acre of casing pipe rusting in their yards because the pipe was ordered from china before the review and arrived after. I know this because several of them can now not pay the money they owe my co. because they can not get rid of the pipe.
The royalty review had no real effect on the oilsands and likely never would have. (Except for Hugo Stelmach trying to "renegotiate" the Suncor and Syncrude contracts breeding uncertainty in a sector that requires Billions of investment and KNOWN factors in order to plan decades in advance) Millions of dollars of extra royalty to the bigs in fort mac is nothing but a rounding error to them. But it hit the small players, especially the tight hole NG players hard. That is why they tried to tweek the royalties on gas a little while ago but had no effect. Too little too late.
Bottom line. Co.s and investors dont like uncertainty and the AB created that in spades by trying to get "our fair share" (code words for the useless who do nothing or risk nothing) to get a piece of the pie instead of going out and earning it.
I always laugh when people said it had NO effect. That is why the rig counts in AB dropped like a rock but shot up like a rocket in Sask and BC
If BC and Sask want to raise their rates have at it. The oil co.s know one thing for certain. The oil will always be there. They can wait.
To be sure the global economic conditions have had a major impact. As someone who was there and operated in the oilpatch during and after the royalty change I can attest it had a MAJOR EFFECT.
Live in denile if you wish but the bottom line is simple. If an oil co. can make more by simply moving his operations into a neighboring province THEY WILL...
AND THEY DID