At this research centre, we invented a technology called LASER. You can see the heavy oil is located underground. Heavy oil is more like peanut butter than liquid. So we need to inject steam and solvent so you can make it thinner and it would flow.

Oil sands is a relatively new science. We're learning things continuously and improving things everyday. We are allocated a certain amount of water for our process. We don't want to bring one drop more of water on-site than we need to.

This area here used to be a mine. The distant hills have now been reclaimed to a forest. It's really important to us that people hear about the good work that we're doing. It's really important to us that people hear about the good work that we're doing.

We use steam to recover the oil in the oil sands. Generating steam also creates greenhouse gases Our challenge is to reduce these emissions. In 2005, in our Calgary research centre, we developed a new technology that makes the process more efficient, reducing these emissions by 25%.

• Read about Eddie Lui and in situ extraction of bitumen
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Garrett Brown of ConocoPhillips is part of the team that is applying new thinking to reforestation in the oil sands. Drawing on research from the University of Alberta, they are helping forests get started faster.

• Read about Garrett Brown and Faster Forests
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