Ovintiv

Former logo (as Encana)

When the Canadian Pacific Railway was formed, the government of Sir John A. Macdonald compensated it for assuming the risk of developing the railroad with the subsurface rights for a checkerboard pattern of most of Alberta and part of Saskatchewan. These rights were later spun off to Encana's predecessors.[8]

In 1883, Canadian Pacific Railway drilled for water near Medicine Hat, Alberta and discovered natural gas.[9]

On July 3, 1958, Canadian Pacific created "Canadian Pacific Oil and Gas" to manage its oil and gas properties and its mineral rights.[10]

In 1971, Canadian Pacific Oil and Gas merged with "Central-Del Rio Oils", creating "Pan Canadian Petroleum Limited".[11][12]

In April 2002, PanCanadian Petroleum Ltd was spun out of Canadian Pacific Limited. It subsequently merged with Alberta Energy Corporation to form EnCana. Gwyn Morgan was named president and CEO.[1]

In January 2007, the company sold its assets in Chad to China National Petroleum Corporation for $202.5 million.[13][14]

In May 2007, the company sold its assets in the delta of the Mackenzie River.[15]

In spring 2008, residents from Pavillion, Wyoming, approached the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) about changes in water quality from their domestic wells. Encana was the primary natural gas producer in the area. In 2009, the EPA announced that it had found hydrocarbon contaminants in residents' drinking water wells.[16]

The Bow, Encana and Cenovus' headquarters, was announced in 2006 and completed in 2013

In 2009 Encana split in two with its oil business, representing one-third of total production and reserves, spinning off into Cenovus Energy, and EnCana Corporation retaining its natural gas business.[17][18] Investors favoured the split as it allowed the flexibility to choose between investing in oil, gas, or both.[19]

In November 2011, a potential buyer backed out of a $45 million deal to buy the company's gas field in Pavillion, Wyoming.[20]

In December 2011, the company sold the majority of its natural gas producing assets in the Barnett Shale.[21]

In February 2012, Mitsubishi paid approximately C$2.9 billion for a 40% interest in the Cutbank Ridge Partnership with Encana, which involves 409,000 net acres of Montney Formation natural gas lands in northeast British Columbia.[22][23] The company also sold its midstream assets in the Cutbank Ridge to Veresen for C$920 million.[24]

In December 2012, Encana announced a US$2.1 billion joint venture with state-owned, Beijing-based PetroChina through which PetroChina received a 49.9% stake in Encana's Duvernay Formation acreage in Alberta. This was in line with the rules that "favor minority stakes over takeovers" since Prime Minister Stephen Harper's December 7, 2012 prohibition of purchases by state-owned enterprises seeking to invest in Canadian oil.[25][26]

At the end of 2012, Encana's staff had increased to 4,169 employees.[27]

Encana and Cenovus' headquarters, The Bow in Calgary, was completed in 2013, becoming the tallest building in Canada outside of Toronto.[28] The project, owned by H&R REIT, was announced as Encana's headquarters in 2006, prior to the Cenovus split.[29]

In November 2013, the company announced layoffs of 20% of its employees, closure of its office in Plano, Texas, and plans to sell assets and to found a separate company for its mineral rights and royalty interests across southern Alberta.[27] It planned to invest 75% of its 2014 capital budget into 5 projects: Projects in the Montney Formation and the Duvernay Formation in Alberta, the San Juan Basin in New Mexichttps://finance.yahoo.com/news/encana-shift-united-states-rebrand-151103909.htmlo, Louisiana's Tuscaloosa Marine Shale, and the Denver-Julesburg Basin (DJ Basin) in northeast Colorado, Wyoming, and Nebraska.[27]

In June 2014, the company sold its Bighorn assets in Alberta to Jupiter Resources for US$1.8 billion.[30]

In November 2014, Encana acquired Athlon Energy for $7.1 billion.[31]

In May 2014, Jonah Energy LLC acquired Encana's Jonah Field operations in Sublette County, Wyoming.[32]

In June 2014, the company acquired assets in the Eagle Ford Group from Freeport-McMoRan for $3.1 billion.[33]

In August 2015, the company sold its assets in the Haynesville Shale for $850 million to affiliates of GSO Capital Partners and GeoSouthern Energy.[34]

In December 2015, the company significantly cut its dividend and capital expenditures budget after a fall in energy prices.[35]

In July 2016, the company sold its assets in the Denver Basin for $900 million.[36][37]

In June 2017, the company sold its assets in the Piceance Basin for $735 million.[38][39]

In May 2018, the company permanently ceased production at Deep Panuke. The Deep Panuke project produced and processed natural gas 250 kilometers offshore southeast of Halifax, Nova Scotia.[40][41]

In December 2018, the company sold its assets in the San Juan Basin for $480 million.[42][43]

In February 2019, the company acquired Newfield Exploration.[44][45]

In October 2019, the company announced its intentions of moving operations from Canada to the US, and changing its name to Ovintiv.[46] Its new headquarters would be in Denver, Colorado, where its CEO already lived.[7]

Of particular criticism was the removal of the "Cana" in EnCana, which was thought to symbolize the changing of headquarters from Calgary to Denver. As reported by the National Post, Encana's departure "only intensified the gloom enveloping the Canadian energy industry after foreign companies sold more than US$30 billion" [47].Youssef Youssef, a commerce professor at Humber College in Toronto, also takes this perspective, citing the difficulty in changing a brand as recognizable as this one "(Encana) was a solid brand and it had resonance within the Canadian oil industry, and everybody knows the company, so to change the brand, it takes a lot of steps,” [48] Encana joins fellow pipeline owner TransCanada Corp., which was renamed to TC Energy Corp. earlier this year - a clear and apparent lack of Canada in the name.

On January 14, 2020, the company announced[49] that more than 90% of its stockholders approved the company's previously announced re-domicile from Calgary, Alberta, Canada, to Denver, Colorado, United States and to its name change from Encana Corporation to Ovintiv Inc.[49] Ten days later, on January 24, 2020, the company announced[3] that it had completed the re-domicile and name change, and further that its existing stock ticker symbol ECA would be delisted from both the New York Stock Exchange and the Toronto Stock Exchange on Monday, January 27, 2020, and that it would begin trading under the same as OVV effective that same date.[3]

From 2008 through 2010, Encana accumulated 250,000 net acres in the Collingwood-Utica Shale gas play in the Middle Ordovician Collingwood formation of the Michigan Basin at an average cost of $150/acre.[51] In May 2012, Encana had paid about $185 an acre for oil and gas rights on 2,156 acres (873 hectares) at an auction by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, which was "88 percent less than the average paid two years ago in the area".[52]

In July 2012, Reuters reported about e-mails between Encana and Chesapeake Energy, the second-largest natural gas producer in the U.S., to divide up Michigan counties state land leases to suppress land prices in an October 2010 auction.[53] In 2013, a private landowner filed suit against Encana and Chesapeake for bid rigging.[54] Justice Department and Michigan authorities were investigating whether state or federal laws were violated; the Internal Revenue Service and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission also investigated.

In 2013, two property owners adjacent to a drilling unit filed suit against the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) and Encana for potential harm due to proximity. In October 2013, the judge of the Circuit Court of Ingham County issued an injunction against Encana starting to drill until an administrative hearing before DEQ's supervisor of wells had been completed, re part 12 of DEQ's rules for oil and gas operations.[55] In May 2014, the supervisor of wells found with Encana, that the petitioners did "not have standing", because they did not own land within the drilling unit and dismissed the case.[56]

In November 2013, Ecojustice, the Sierra Club and the Wilderness Committee filed a lawsuit against Encana Corporation and the British Columbia's Oil and Gas Commission for excessive water use from lakes and rivers for its hydraulic fracturing for shale gas, "granted by repeated short-term water permits, a violation of the provincial water act".[57]

In Pouce Coupe British Columbia five explosions targeted Encana pipelines between October 2008 and January 2009; media reports indicate the pipeline may have been bombed by a disgruntled community member fearing the sour gas (containing hydrogen sulfide, which can be fatal if too much of it is inhaled) poses a danger to the community.[58]

Encana's hydraulic fracturing operations in the United States are portrayed in the 2010 documentary, Gasland, which alleges that hydraulic fracturing causes pollution of ground and surface water, air, and soil.[59]

Issues were raised for the Deep Panuke project offshore of Nova Scotia, when it was proposed in 2006 as a smaller version with increased ocean discharges and when Encana asked for a "streamlined regulatory process" without public hearings.[60]