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| Company type | Subsidiary |
|---|---|
| Industry | Oil and gas industry |
| Founded | 1975; 50 years ago (1975), inOttawa,Ontario |
| Successor | Suncor Energy |
| Headquarters | , Canada |
Key people | Steven Williams (president &CEO) |
Production output | Oil,natural gas,petrochemicals |
| Revenue |  C$76.911 billion (2022) |
Number of employees | 4,514 (2008)[1] |
| Parent | Suncor Energy |
| Website | www |
Petro-Canada (colloquially known asPetro-Can) is a retail and wholesale marketing brand subsidiary ofSuncor Energy. Until 1991, it was afederal Crown corporation (astate-owned enterprise). In August 2009, Petro-Canada merged with Suncor Energy, with Suncor shareholders receiving approximately 60 percent ownership of the combined company and Petro-Canada shareholders receiving approximately 40 percent. The company retained the Suncor Energy name for the merged corporation and itsupstream operations. It continues to use the Petro-Canada name nationwide.
In 1973,world oil prices quadrupled due to theArab oil embargo following theYom Kippur War. The province ofAlberta had substantialoil reserves, whose extraction had long been controlled byAmerican corporations. The government ofPrime MinisterPierre Trudeau and the oppositionNew Democratic Party felt that these corporations geared most of their production to the American market, and as a result little of the benefit of rising oil prices went to Canadians. During debates in the Canadian House of Commons, for example,Tommy Douglas supported the new Crown Corporation by saying: "It should be remembered that the people of Canada have paid billions of dollars to enlarge and enrich foreign oil companies, and only now, belatedly, are we setting up an economic vehicle to develop our petroleum resources for the benefit of Canadians."[2]
Trudeau'sLiberals were then in aminority government and dependent upon the support of the NDP to stay in power. The idea also fit with the growing movement toward economic nationalism within the Liberals. The Liberals and NDP passed the bill over the opposition of theProgressive Conservative Party led byRobert Stanfield.
Petro-Canada was founded as aCrown Corporation in 1975 by an act of Parliament. It started its operations on 1 January 1976. The company was given C$1.5 billion in start-up money and easy access to new sources of capital. It was set up in Calgary, despite the hostility of existing oil firms.[citation needed] Its first president wasMaurice Strong. The Progressive Conservatives (PCs), then led byAlbertanJoe Clark, were opponents of the company, and advocated breaking it up and selling it. However, they were unable to proceed with these plans during their brief time in power in 1979–80.
With the establishment of Petro-Canada, the federal government transferred its 45% stake inPanarctic Oils Ltd. and its 12% stake inSyncrude to the newly established company. In 1976, Petro-Canada purchasedAtlantic Richfield Canada, in 1978Pacific Petroleums, and in 1981 the Canadian operations ofPetrofina. Most of the original Petro-Canada refineries and service stations were acquired fromBP Canada in 1983.
The company became popular outside of Alberta as a symbol of Canadian nationalism[citation needed]. It quickly grew to become one of the largest players in the traditional oil fields of the west as well as in theoil sands and the East coast offshore oil fields.
When the Liberals returned to power in 1980, energy policy was an important focus, and the sweepingNational Energy Program was created. This expanded Petro-Canada, but was seen as detrimental to Alberta's economy. The PC government ofPrime MinisterBrian Mulroney (1984–1993) stopped using Petro-Canada as a policy tool (also abandoning the National Energy Program with it), and it began to compete fully and successfully[3] with the private sector companies while abandoning its founding principles ofeconomic nationalism.
In 1990, the Mulroney government announced its intention to privatize Petro-Canada, and the first shares were sold on the open market in July 1991 at $13 each.[citation needed] The government began to slowly sell its majority control, but kept a 19% stake in the company. No other shareholder was allowed to own more than 10%, however. Also, foreigners could not control more than 25% of the company.
During the first year, the value of the shares gradually dropped to $8 as Petro-Canada suffered a loss of $603 million, primarily because of the devaluation of some assets.[citation needed] The newly private company significantly reduced the number of properties in which it had a direct interest. It reduced its annual operating costs by $300 million and it went from a staff of close to 11,000 to only about 5,000 employees. Many of these laid-off employees went on to work and start up other oil companies in Alberta, creating a new group of Canadian producers. But many did not work in other oil companies and some left Alberta to find work elsewhere.[citation needed]
In his2004 federal budget,Finance MinisterRalph Goodale pledged to sell the government's remaining stake in the company; by the end of the year it had sold its 19% stake, 49 million shares in all, for net proceeds of $3.2 billion.[4] As of June 2007, the company's largest shareholders were Capital Research and Management Company (aCapital Group company), with 7.3%, andBarclays, with 4%.[5]
On March 23, 2009,Suncor Energy announced its intent to acquire Petro-Canada, which would form a company with a combined market capitalization of C$43.3 billion. Suncor planned to rebrand its existingSunoco-branded retail operations in Ontario under the Petro-Canada name following the completion of the acquisition.[6][7][8][9]
The sale was approved by shareholders in June 2009,[10][11] and completed on August 1, 2009.[12][13] As a condition of the purchase, Suncor was required to divest some of its retail outlets. In December 2009, 98 Suncor-owned gas stations in Ontario (68 Sunoco and 30 Petro-Canada) were sold toHusky Energy.[14]
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As of 2008, Petro-Canada was Canada's 11th largest company and the second-largestdownstream company, with important interests in such projects asHibernia,Terra Nova, andWhite Rose; itsgas stations remained a presence in most Canadian cities. It owned refineries inEdmonton,Alberta (135,000 bpd) andMontreal,Quebec (160,000 bpd), accounting for 16% of the Canadian industry's total refining capacity. All these facilities are currently run by Suncor.
Petro-Canada had a lubricants plant inMississauga,Ontario, but Suncor sold the unit toHollyFrontier in late 2016.[15]
At one time, the company had international operations inAlgeria, theNetherlands,Tunisia, theUnited Kingdom,Syria,Italy,Libya,Trinidad and Tobago,Venezuela,Morocco andNorway. These sites outside ofNorth America were run by the International and Offshore Business Unit of Petro-Canada with its headquarters inLondon. This was the largest business unit, and much of its assets were part of the formerVeba Oel company based inEssen,Germany.
In January 2019, Petro-Canada installedelectric vehiclecharging stations at one of their gas stations inMilton, Ontario, making it the company's first EV chargers.[16] The following month, Suncor announced that it would develop a national network of charging stations serving theTrans-Canada Highway.[17]
As early as the mid-1990s in some Alberta locations, Petro-Canada started opening a new fast-food deli-oriented branded convenience store called Neighbours. Most of these stores are in the GTA.[18] The kitchen provided freshly made sandwiches as well as breakfast and burgers heated from frozen, and in most cases was open from early morning till 9 or 10 in the evening. As of 2013, many of these Neighbours stores have had their kitchens' afternoon and dinner hours drastically slashed and some have been permanently closed and are being rebranded to A&W.[citation needed]
In 2006, Petro-Canada launched a pre-paid wireless carrier known as Petro-Canada Mobility. It is amobile virtual network operator (MVNO) on theRogers Wireless network.[citation needed]
Petro Points is the chain'sloyalty program. Petro-Canada previously offered a co-branded Petro PointsMasterCard in partnership withCitibank Canada. In June 2010,CIBC announced its intent to acquire Citibank's Canadian MasterCard portfolio, including the co-branded Petro-Canada cards.[19] Petro Points currently offers bonuses forRBC clients.
Around 220 Petro-Canada outlets include a "SuperWash"car wash; the majority of these operations use soft touch systems, but some (particularly those that were formerly Sunoco stations) feature touchless equipment instead. Some newer locations feature a "Glide Auto Wash"—a soft touch tunnel that utilizes a flatconveyor belt rather than the roller-based systems traditionally used.
In May 2023, Suncor announced an agreement withCanadian Tire Corporation to convert its over 200 Canadian Tire Gas+ locations to Petro-Canada. This will include integration of Petro Points with Canadian Tire's Triangle Rewards program.[20]
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