Driven by technology, drilling in the four decades old Pembina oil field increased, re-launching the field to the center of Alberta's oil economy. Hydraulic fracturing in Canada Massive hydraulic fracturing has been widely used in Alberta since the late 1970s. The method is currently used in development of the Cardium, Duvernay, Montney and Viking formations in Alberta, Bakken formation in Saskatchewan, Montney and Horn River formations in British Columbia. Public companies The year 2009 saw consolidation, with land sales, corporate transactions, and public companies with Cardium assets acquired by those intending to apply newer recovery-techniques to improve field economics. Oil-and-gas companies participating in this activity include: PetroBakken (, through its acquisitions of Berens Energy, Result Energy and Rondo Petroleum) Daylight Resources Trust (, through its acquisition of Highpine Energy and merger with West Energy, ) PennWest (, with a large land base) Paramount Resources ( through its acquisition of Profound Energy) Bonterra Energy Crescent Point Energy (, through its acquisition of TriAxon Resources) and the smaller Bellatrix (), Delphi Energy (), Peyto Energy Trust (). Dozens of other companies have land leases in the Cardium fairway, but have not employed horizontal drilling in the Cardium. Exxon Mobil recently started testing the Cardium Formation. References Stratigraphy of Alberta Stratigraphy of British Columbia Upper Cretaceous Series of North America Coniacian Stage Santonian Stage Turonian Stage Sandstone formations of Canada Shale formations Reservoir rock formations