Smart Sand and Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. have partnered to supply and ship premium, Northern White frac sand to the unconventional oil and gas industry in key North America producing regions (including the Bakken and Eagle Ford formations, and the Utica and Marcellus Shales). The partnership’s first initiative: building a new frac sand transload facility, expected to be the region’s largest, in Makoti, North Dakota that will serve the Bakken formation in the Williston Basin beginning in early 2013.
"We are excited to partner with transportation leader Canadian Pacific to bring our combined expertise to those companies working in the Bakken Shale formation,” said Charles Young, founder, president and board member of Smart Sand. “Smart Sand offers substantial dry sand capacity and 100-plus years of proven reserves, plus direct rail access for unit trains. We believe the new North Dakota transload facility offers a unique combination of cost effectiveness, reliability and product flexibility. We look forward to offering similar services in other producing regions while building strong relationships in the Williston Basin.”
Smart Sand’s primary facility, which opened in late June 2012 and is located on the CP rail line in Oakdale, Wisconsin, will supply premium Northern White frac sand in a broad range of mesh sizes to the new transload facility. Based on Smart Sand’s initial processing capacity of more than one million tons per year, plus the company’s extensive proven reserves, the facility will be able to quickly fulfill long- and short-term orders while providing direct rail access for unit trains.
Canadian Pacific is the only North American railroad to serve the Bakken Formation, the Alberta Industrial Heartland and the Marcellus Shale. In addition, CP is the only Class I railway to connect the energy hubs of the US Midwest, Alberta and Saskatchewan to the Northeast US. Through its network to the Northeast US and through the Kansas City gateway to the US Gulf Coast, CP is able to partner with the energy industry to facilitate growth in moving oil and energy-related materials. Each year, CP moves hundreds of thousands of carloads of energy-related products, including crude oil, sulphur, fuels, diluents and materials key to the energy industry, such as pipe and frac sand.
