Marubeni-Itochu Steel to Launch Steel Pipe Service JV in Northern Canada

Marubeni-Itochu Steel announced on Tuesday the Canadian steel pipe business subsidiary, Halmark Tubulars agreed with Canadian firms to establish oil well and line pipe distributing joint venture in Mackenzie Delta Region, northern Canada. They launch the JV in the summer to start operation with as much as 20,000 tonnes of inventory, mainly for seamless pipe. Halmark Tubulars, in which Marubeni-Itochu Tubulars America has 95% of interest, has 33% interest in the JV, Mackenzie Integrated Tubular Solutions. Local Inuit autonomy, Inuvialuit Regional Corp. group’s Inuvialuit Development Corp. and Northern Transportation Co. have 67% of the JV. Energy market focuses on oil sand development in Alberta, Canada under surging oil price. Oil majors started development of natural gas in Mackenzie Delta Region, where estimated 10 trillion cubic feet of resources, to produce oil sand and refine the products. Marubeni-Itochu Steel decided to launch steel pipe supply JV to serve many development projects, which plan to build gas wells and pipelines.