Sanjel is one of the companies the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce is investigating on the potential environmental impacts from hydraulic fracturing.
“Sanjel Corporation is a privately owned, Canadian-based, international oilfield service company with over two and a half decades of industry experience. As a major competitor in the global oil and gas market and the largest privately owned oilfield service company in Canada, Sanjel offers five specialized service lines including Acidizing, Cementing, Coiled Tubing, Fracturing and Nitrogen.”
(Editor’s Note 6 Dec 2023)This updated article was first published in 2010.
See also: Dan Healing. Buyer to close Sanjel’s Calgary headquarters due to ‘miserable’ demand. 18 May 2016. Calgary Herald.
The head of the firm buying Sanjel Corp., Canada’s largest privately held well-fracking company, says the target company’s headquarters in Calgary will be shuttered when the deal closes later this month as a result of “miserable” demand for its oilfield services.
Regan Davis, president and CEO of Step Energy Services, also said reports from two Sanjel employees that all but a handful of staff are losing their jobs are “comically inaccurate,” but refused to give actual workforce numbers or say how many Sanjel staff will be offered Step jobs.
Dan Healing. Buyer to close Sanjel’s Calgary headquarters due to ‘miserable’ demand. 18 May 2016. Calgary Herald.
See also: Jeffrey Jones. Privately held Sanjel broken up and sold to rivals. 4 Apr 2016. The Globe and Mail.
Calgary-based Sanjel’s breakup comes as the energy-services sector reels from the effects of the oil-price collapse, which has led exploration and production companies to slash spending on operations such as drilling and other development activities.
Little has been written about Sanjel’s inner workings over the years, but a filing for a debt issue in 2014 shed some light on the company’s finances.
It was founded in 1982 by Don MacDonald, the company’s chairman. Two years ago it ran offices in Calgary, Houston, Denver, Dubai and Mexico City, and employed 4,100 people. His son, Darin MacDonald, had been the company’s president and chief executive. The two had equal financial control over the family’s holdings, which included energy businesses, real estate assets and capital and technology units.
In fiscal 2014 – before the energy industry downturn – it had revenue of $1.4-billion, making it third among well-cementing and pressure pumping firms behind Trican Well Service Ltd. and Calfrac Well Services Ltd. Both of those companies have undergone major cost-cutting and job cuts to cope with the severe drop in business over the past year and a half.
Jeffrey Jones. Privately held Sanjel broken up and sold to rivals. 4 Apr 2016. The Globe and Mail.
See: Schlumberger
See: Chevron Human Energy Stories | Addressing Climate Change
See: Ceres Principles – Corporate Environmental Conduct
See: The Next Drilling Disaster?
See: Natural Gas Industry Shills Use the Media to Mislead the Public – Here’s How to Spot Them
See: This Website is a Crash Course In Fracking
See: Affirming Gasland
See: Natural gas: the commodity world’s ugly duckling
See: Halliburton
See: BJ Services
