CALGARY — Alberta’s energy minister has said that Canadian oil production is at “record levels” and that “Alberta is leading the way.”Minister Brian Jean’s comments come as data from the Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) shows provincial oil production surpassed 4.1 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2025, representing a record and a roughly 4.2% increase from 2024..Alberta had a total output of more than 1.5 billion barrels overall.Canadian Natural Resources has also issued production guidance for 2026 of roughly 1.62 million barrels of oil equivalent per day, up approximately 3% from 2025.Overall production in Alberta has more than doubled since 2010, and output from some of the country’s largest producers has seen record levels over the past twelve months.Calgary-based Suncor Energy, which also recently reported producing 860,000 bpd in 2025, produced 33,000 more barrels per day than in 2024.Suncor also hit a new refining record of 480,000 bpd, which was 15,000 barrels higher than the prior year.According to Suncor chief executive officer Rich Kruger, production and refining teams “have not only been breaking records, they have been shattering records at the high end of guidance for two years in a row.”The company boosted its daily oil production by roughly 114,000 bpd over the past two years to 909,000, and refining increased by about 60,000 barrels over that time.“We met or exceeded every single target a full year—or more—early,” Kruger said..PIPELINE PIVOT: BC supports Trans Mountain boost as Alberta looks to double oil production.Canadian Natural Resources, Suncor, and Cenovus Energy are all projected to now rank among the world’s 20 largest non-state-owned oil and gas producers due to expected 2026 output.Increased pipeline capacity has also supported the current rate of growth, including the Trans Mountain expansion and Enbridge’s Line 3 replacement.With additional pipeline expansions currently under review, there is the possibility of adding hundreds of thousands of bpd more in export capacity later this decade.Analysts also expect oil sands production to continue rising through the second half of the decade.“We need to increase capacity and build new pipelines to avoid bottlenecks in the system which will hurt the value of our oil and trading confidence in our ability to deliver,” Jean said in a statement.“That’s why diversifying our trading partners has never been more important, and we are encouraged that the federal government understands this need and the importance of building a new oil pipeline to Canada’s West Coast.”
