Alberta

Targets: Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin (WCSB)

Geologic age: 100 million years

Quidnet uses the pressure found deep within the rock of Alberta as a natural resource that enables our innovative GPS technology. The level of this pressure is determined by the regional sedimentary conditions developed over millions of years of geological activity.

Due to the prolific history of oil and gas drilling across the province of Alberta, the rock here is perhaps the most studied in Canada. This valuable existing research provides Quidnet with an abundance of data that helps our geologists identify target locations for the deployment of Quidnet’s GPS energy storage solution. The rock in each site location must have suitable subsurface conditions and contain no unwanted hydrocarbon content.

The shales of the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin (WCSB) date to the middle- Cretaceous period, when sediment collected in the lowlands near the base of the Rocky Mountains. At the time, the global sea level was so high that a shallow seaway spanned from the Arctic north of Canada to the Gulf of Mexico. Much like a river delta collects silt, sediment accumulated as clay on the basin floor of this inland sea until, over millions of years, the buried clay hardened to become the sedimentary rock known as shale.

Shale is the most common seal for hydrocarbons (natural gas and petroleum), in part because of the ability of this rock to trap vast pockets of mineral wealth. This same characteristic – known as “impermeability” – makes it ideal for storing pressurized water without leaking. The shale deposits of the WCSB, in some places up to six kilometers (3.7 mi) thick, can be found underlying 1.4 million square kilometers (540,000 sq mi) of Western Canada including Alberta and parts of British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and the Northwest Territories.

Through testing, Quidnet has verified that the storage pressure of the rock in Alberta is substantial. To build a traditional pumped storage facility with equivalent water pressure through gravity alone, the water would need to be pumped into a reservoir over 2,000 feet up a cliff. Quidnet's GPS provides the energy generation capacity of pumped storage on a smaller footprint and independent of terrain.