Growing oil production in Western Canada has compelled BP Pipelines to plan a rerouting of Canadian oil from Chicago to Oklahoma, a major oil-trading hub, it was learned Friday.

The subsidiary of multinational oil company BP said light crude oil sent to Cushing, Oklahoma would open new markets and increase capacity for Canadian light sweet crude. The company declared “open season”, a time when suppliers of oil can negotiate new pipeline capacity at discounted rates.

Early engineering is studying reversing an existing 22-inch, 600-mile known as the BP No. 1 Pipeline.

“Assuming adequate shipper support, the reversed pipeline could be in southbound service as early as the middle of 2009 with an expected capacity of 100,000 barrels per day and the potential for future expansions to bring total capacity to 200,000 barrels per day,” a statement said.