$1 a barrel oil

OK, let us assume that tax protection of the tar sands development is a good thing. Which means $1 royalty on net profit per barrel until initial investment is paid off then a jump to a $25 royalty. Wiki says:

the world's first oil sands mine was started by Great Canadian Oil Sands (now Suncor) back in 1967. The Syncrude mine (the biggest mine in the world) followed in 1978

One would think that by now there should be plenty of $25 / barrel royalties coming in.

I thought the Alberta Conservatives brought in the royalty ($1 - $25) agreement in 1996. Does that mean prior projects are paying $25 a barrel? It also implies that incentives to rape the environment and the resource are not a necessary inducement for the oil companies; they would have done it anyway.

Even if the agreement was retroactive, shouldn't there be data on the emerging $25/barrel royalites from 1967 and 1978? Like a two-line graph relating 25-year investment expiration and barrels of oil? Oh, it is all too confusing for me!

How about some data:
year 2000; royalties $700 million; production 600000 barrels/day; oil company revenue $8 billion
year 2002; royalties $100 million; production 740000 barrels/day; oil company revenue $9.3 billion

Does that make sense? The year 2002 royalty is less than a dollar a barrel! It is more like $.37 per barrel. Good goin' Alberta Conservatives! If the price of oil crashes then the oil companies will be able to take oil out of the ground for free! Some deal for Albertans.

The oil companies are taking the pending profits and re-investing (they say) into the tar sands. The people of Alberta are screwed of royalties, yet the oil companies get increased revenue. An irreplaceable, non-renewable resource continues to erode with no offseting reward to the people of Alberta.

Royalty should be based NOT on net profit per barrel of oil but instead on gross barrels of resource produced -- on production instead of net profit per barrel. Why should Alberta residents pay oil companies to be fantastically creative in accounting?

Alberta must introduce an additional immediate surtax royalty of $1 per barrel of oil produced.

Canada must also immediately tax [export] barrels to make sure scarce product is not consumed at below (developed country) market prices, such as in Europe. We Albertans and Canadians should not be subsidizing American competitive advantage over Europe with 75% cheaper oil.