On a spending tear of late, Norwegian oil company Statoil will now also pay $2 billion in cash for all the equity in North American Oil Sands Corp., a first oil sands venture for the Norwegians, it was undestood Friday.

The Calgary-based NAOSC operates some 250,000 square kilometres of oil sands leases in the Athabasca region northeast of Edmonton. It is estimated that the NAOSC leases hold 2.2 billion barrels in recoverable reserves.

“Today's acquisition is an important strategic move which supports our global growth ambition and increases our reserve bookings in the long term,” Statoil chief exec, Helge Lund, said in a statement. He said the oil sands production would add to Statoil’s after 2010.

Heavy oil-sands oil is produced by mining or extreme heating, methods unlike those of Statoil’s North Sea stronghold. Lund assured shareholders SAG-D-technology would mitigate the harmful effects, as the steam-assisted, gravity-drainage technique “gives a much smaller environmental footprint than strip mining.”

Injection techniques, experience with large projects like Snoehvit and experience building heavy oil plant in Venezuela bode well for Statoil in the Canadian Northwest.

A pilot production scheme, the Leismer project, is in a final phase of obtaining regulatory approvals to clear the processing of 10,000 barrels of bitumen per day, starting in 2010.

The first phase of a commercial project, Kai Kos Dehseh, is planned to come on stream in 2011 with 100,000 bbls per day by around 2015. The new holdings are expected to yield more than 200,000 barrels per day by 2020.

The Athabasca region in Canada is one of the world’s largest heavy-oil plays, the biggest of three oil sands deposits in Alberta. Other deposits are Peace River and Cold Lake.

ws@oilgas24.com