Western Oil Sands Inc. holds a 20 percent undivided ownership in a multi-billion dollar Joint Venture that is exploiting a portion of one of the largest reservoirs of crude oil in the world. Shell Canada Limited (Shell) and Chevron Canada Limited (ChevronTexaco) hold the remaining 60 and 20 percent ownership interests in the Joint Venture, respectively. The Project, which includes facilities owned by the Joint Venture and third parties, uses established processes to mine oil sands deposits, extract and transport bitumen, and upgrade the bitumen into synthetic crude oil and vacuum gas oil.

The Joint Venture is developing the western portion of Lease 13, a large oil sands lease in the Athabasca region of northeastern Alberta, Canada, held by the owners and granted by the Government of Alberta. The western portion of Lease 13 contains approximately 1.7 billion barrels of proved and probable reserves and is sufficient for 30 years of non-declining bitumen production at 155,000 barrels per day. We have the right to participate in expansion opportunities, including the remaining underdeveloped areas of Lease 13 and three other nearby oil sands leases owned by Shell, referred to as Leases 88, 89 and 90. Within the next decade we expect our production volumes to exceed 100,000 barrels per day.

Western Oil Sands Inc. shares trade on the Toronto Stock Exchange under the symbol WTO.

Source: Western Oil Sands; http://www.westernoilsands.com/