Everyone concerned about the MRC refinery decision should go back and read the article Producer OF The Year by Andrea W. Lorenz which appeared in Oilsands Review and named both Encana and Connacher Oil & Gas producers of the year in December 2007.

The article starts out with the following paragraph which clearly articulates why Connacher bought the MRC Refinery:

"With justifiable pride, Connacher Oil & Gas chief operating officer Pete Sametz calls his company a "mini integrated producer." Having worked in the heavy oil business long before it became the commodity to invest in, when differentials barely justified producing it and refineries would only pay good money for it during the paving season, Sametz and company founder, president and chief executive officer Dick Gusella knew that a small company could quickly be eaten up by the biggerr players. If they were to survive in the oilsands business, they would have to design a new model, one that contained multiple shock absorbers. Sametz explains the strategy. "We're trying to physically hedge lockstep downstream with what we're doing upstream." Thus, even before the company starts producing, it has cushioned both sides of the equation - on the upstream side with natural gas production and on the downstream side with refining capacity. "What's driving [our strategy] is we're producing a very tough barrel and it's hard to make money on it," Sametz explains."

http://www.connacheroil.com/document...

This is Connacher's strategy for going forward. Those of you who own shares in Connacher hoping that it will sell the refinery or the conventional natural gas side of the business at some point and operate as a stand alone bitumen business have made a bad business decision because Connacher will not do this according to its strategic model. If Connacher had started out as a stand alone bitumen producer like Deer Creek was, Connacher would have been bought out along time ago by one of the big companies most likely. It may be time for some to rethink their original business decision to buy Connacher. Me I'm staying put as I like the model and I trust management's vision.

Best Wishes; Scott