Oil Sands Shift Economic Power in Canada

Some of the biggest international oil players plan to invest C$100 billion (US$85.66 billion) over the next decade into developing the gooey oil sands here. Alberta is at the center of a new energy-based Canadian economy that promises to be all the more crucial to the US.

As more oil flows, more economic power and population are shifting westward from the traditional manufacturing centers of Ontario and Quebec, which are trailing in comparison. The rising West is splitting the national economy, forcing the industrial monoliths back east to retool and reorient manufacturing to supply the growing oil economy.

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