A flurry of activity is raising optimism that Royal Dutch Shell Plc and its partners are ready to go ahead with the nation’s largest infrastructure project: a $40 billion liquefied natural gas terminal that could at last unlock energy exports to Asia.

“I would put money on it — it’s going ahead,” says Phil Germuth, mayor of Kitimat, who recently hosted a banker from Barclays Bank Plc visiting from the U.K. to examine the project. Germuth also met a group of officials reporting to the board of Mitsubishi Corp., one of the project’s five partners, who visited the site in May.

LNG Canada, as the project is called, is stunning in scale. It proposes to eventually ship as much as 28 million tons a year out of Kitimat, the equivalent of 10 per cent of global LNG supply in 2017, according to reports by…. CLICK for the complete article

Suncor Energy Inc. says production at the Syncrude oilsands complex is expected to ramp up to full production in early to mid-September after a power disruption in June that shut down operations.

The company, which holds a 58.7 per cent stake in the partnership, says a preliminary investigation indicates the disruption was caused by a transformer malfunction the cut power on June 20…. CLICK for complete article