Canada

Main Business Activities

• Upstream and Integrated Gas
• Downstream
• Manufacturing
• Chemicals
• Trading and Supply

Shell has been operating in Canada since 1911. Canada’s downstream business is anchored in our Scotford Complex. With over 400,000 barrels per day in refining capacity (upgrader and refinery), Scotford is a large refining and petrochemical facility that includes a bitumen upgrader, an oil refinery, a chemicals facility and the Quest carbon capture and storage (CCS) facility. Shell’s Sarnia Manufacturing Centre in Ontario includes a refinery and chemicals plant and has a daily production capacity of 85,000 barrels of crude oil. Shell also has trading and supply, aviation, sulphur, retail and lubricants businesses.

Our Alberta Light Tight Oil asset produces over 37,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day. In British Columbia, we produce natural gas at our Groundbirch asset, which has 479 producing wells and four gas plants.

Shell also has a 40% interest in the LNG Canada joint venture, which is in the construction phase.

Country Financial Analysis

The statutory corporate income tax rate for Shell in Canada was 24.16% in 2020.

The difference between the statutory rate and actual taxes accrued/paid is because of the cycle of upstream projects, whereby large capital expenditures in earlier years generate tax deductions in advance of revenue production. Revenue reductions in 2020 are mainly because of the impact of the pandemic on energy demand. In 2020, the impairment of assets in the upstream unconventional business contributed to the loss before tax.

In the table above, the tax refund arises from the settlement of tax litigation relating to prior taxation years. The tax accrued amounts relate to legal entities which were profitable in the year and for which no prior-year losses are available for offset.

Our Payments to Governments Report for 2020 also shows that Shell paid around $18 million in royalties and fees.