[1] Ormat instead contacted Calgary's Suncor Energy, with whom it founded OPTI as a 50-50 venture, with the Nexen delegation's head, Jim Arnold, as its first employee.
[1] In 2004, the OPTI decided to expand Long Lake to commercial-scale, and raised over $1.5 billion of private equity and debt.
[1][2] In January 2009 OPTI sold 15% working interest in Long Lake project to Nexen for $735 million, following an 89% drop in share price and increasing expenses.
[3][4] In early 2011 OPTI faced severe liquidity problems and an inability to service its $2.8 billion debt.
[7] The Long Lake project uses OPTI's proprietary OrCrude process, which produces usable fuel from byproducts of extracted bitumen.