New Brunswick may only have a few of its own oil wells but it's developed technology to speed up the search for black gold around the world.
Fredericton company Green Imaging Technologies Inc. is using a discovery made by researchers at the University of New Brunswick to use MRI to analyze core samples for oil content.
MRI is best known for its medical applications for seeing inside the human body but the university's Magnetic Resonance Imaging Research Centre has been leading research for 10 years on the use of the technology to look inside materials.
"Rocks are actually mostly empty space, which is either filled with oil, which is the good stuff that we want, or water," said Derrick Green, president of Green Imaging.
"What we can do with MRI is we can image the water within the rock and give you an idea how much oil or how much water is there. Not only that, but we can tell you how the oil and the water moves within the rock so we can give you an idea of how to get it out the rock," Green told CBC News.
In 2006, Green returned to the province from a job in the United States to start the imaging company with his wife, Jill. Both are natives of the province and graduates of the University of New Brunswick.
The company is focusing on marketing the discovery by the university's scientists and turning the technology into a commercial venture. The request to start to the company came directly from Green's doctorate supervisor, Bruce Balcom.
"This is exciting when you see the fruits of your research being put in the hands of former graduate students and applied to industry," Balcom said in a release.
The MRI analysis is more accurate than conventional methods that are used to find oil and its analysis results are returned in less than three days rather than 30 days.
The increasing price of oil and a renewed focus in the industry on finding new petroleum reservoirs has generated a significant level of interest in the technology from big oil companies, Green said.
"We've been working with the oil companies, getting them to supply rock cores to UNB to work on a comparison trial, to show that our measurement is better than what the existing measurement is so they're familiar with the technology," Jill Green said.
"Then we're working with the companies that actually do the rock core testing, showing the technology to them."
Representatives from the company regularly travel to oil headquarters in Houston and Calgary. The company has signed an agreement with ConocoPhillips that has provided three patents to Green Imaging.
Core samples have also be obtained from Chevron, Exxon Mobil, Shell and Saudi Aramco.
"Lot's happening very quickly but in a very good way," Jill said.
