150 | BusinessWorld | August-September 2014
ridefrom of the provincial capital in
Edmonton, but its strategic location on
Highway 2 provides easy access to begin a
five-hour trek to Fort McMurray in the
province's northern reaches, while its
placement alongside Highway 43 is a
convenient starting point for a similarly
timed jaunt to Grande Prairie along the
borderwithBritishColumbia.
The largest military base in Western
Canada – CFB Edmonton – is less than 30
minutes from the center of town, and
ground was broken last September on a
150,000 barrel-per-day bitumen upgrader
and diesel refinery project, the North West
Redwater Partnership, that sits about 45
minutes away.
Site-prep workis under way on the latter
endeavor, which is scheduled for three
phases of construction –estimated at $8.5
billion – and expected to be fully
operational by September 2017.
“The town is well-situated, to say the least,”
said Andrew Isbister, Morinville's director
of corporate services and chief financial
of f icer. “It 's adjacent to Alber ta's
(Industrial) Heartland, and within that
Sturgeon County and Strathcona County
area is where the real business of Alberta
takes place.”
Indeed, the Heartland is billed as one of the
world's most attractive locations for
chemical, petrochemical, oil and gas
investment and is also Canada's largest
hydrocarbon processing region. The
region's 40-plus companies include several
that operate on a world scale and provide
fuels, fertilizers, power and petrochemicals
tobothprovincial and global consumers.
“We're right on the edge of it all here,”
Isbister said. “We've got themilitary people.
We've got people that are working in the
Heartland. And we actually have a number
of residents who work up in the oil sands
around Fort McMurray and they stay in
camps, but they live in Morinville. They
commute back and forth on a 21-day
schedule – 21 days into the plants and then
sevendays backout.”
