Weyburn鈥� Saskatchewan Energy and Resources Minister Dustin Duncan does not have concerns regarding the announced sale of Enbridge鈥檚 south Saskatchewan gathering system to Tundra Energy & Marketing Ltd.
On Oct. 7, Duncan told Pipeline News in his Weyburn鈥揃ig Muddy constituency office, 鈥淚 don鈥檛 think it was a surprise, knowing that Enbridge, moving into the big Spectra merger, was looking at what was core, what was non-core assets to them, and trying to get out of some of their business to do some of the merger.
鈥淥ur understanding is it really has no impact on companies that are feeding into the distribution line at this point, and no real impact on employment. I think, overall, it鈥檚 a positive for the province to see a company like Tundra furthering their investment in Saskatchewan.
鈥淧remier Wall has had conversations with some of the people. I鈥檓 in the process of connecting with Tundra. I look forward to furthering that relationship and welcoming them to the province in a bigger way,鈥� Duncan said.
Asked if he was concerned about having a smaller corporate entity than Enbridge running that pipeline gathering system, with regards to their fiscal capacity to deal with a major spill, Duncan replied, 鈥淣o. It isn鈥檛 a concern. Obviously we need operators with the wherewithal and the size of company to not only maintain the operations, but respond to any difficulties in the future. I think, for Tundra, they would have had to do their due diligence with the age of the pipe, the operations of the pipe in the past. As a company, they would have to factor that in. I suspect a company (like) the Richardsons and Tundra, if it wasn鈥檛 something they couldn鈥檛 take on, they wouldn鈥檛 have. They鈥檝e been in business a long time for a reason. They鈥檙e good operators and a good organization.
鈥淔rom our standpoint, it doesn鈥檛 really raise a flag that it鈥檚 transferring from a company the size of Enbridge to Tundra. We鈥檒l work with them, as we do with all of our operators, pipeline and otherwise, and make sure we鈥檙e doing our part on the regulatory side, and they鈥檙e doing their part as an operator,鈥� Duncan said. 聽
