OREANDA-NEWS. May 15, 2013. Commenting on first quarter results, Steve Laut, President of Canadian Natural stated, "Overall this has been an excellent start to the year for Canadian Natural. Operationally it was a successful quarter, with record quarterly production of approximately 681,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day nearing the top end of our guidance and driven by record liquids production of approximately 489,000 barrels per day.

Primary heavy crude oil had record quarterly production volumes of approximately 133,000 barrels of crude oil per day as a result of a focused heavy crude oil drilling program. This is the ninth consecutive quarter of record heavy crude oil production, keeping us on track for our targeted 13% heavycrude oil production growth in 2013. Additionally, natural gas, thermal in situ bitumen, Pelican Lake heavy crude oil, Horizon SCO, light crude oil and NGLs production volumes all delivered as expected.

Canadian Natural’s thermal in situ oil sands projects had monthly average production in January of approximately 127,600 barrels of bitumen per day before entering the steam cycle in February. Our 40,000 barrels per day Kirby South Phase 1 thermal in situ oil sands project is on cost and ahead of schedule with first steam-in now targeted for the third quarter of 2013, ahead of our original plan of November 2013.

Our Horizon project achieved strong, reliable production volumes in the first quarter of 2013, averaging approximately 109,000 barrels per day, with April 2013 averaging approximately 104,000 barrels per day. Horizon has seen steady production volumes and sustained increases in reliability over the last year as we focus on an enhanced maintenance strategy and operational discipline. Reliability is expected to further increase as we move through the year with a step change in production performance after our first major turnaround. The turnaround commenced April 30, 2013 and is scheduled for 24 days.

Our Company remains well balanced with a large resource base, strong technical expertise and significant financial resources. The prudent development of these diverse assets will enable us to continue to deliver premium value and defined growth. We continue to execute on our strategy of focusing on projects which maximize returns to our shareholders in the near-, mid- and long-term."

Canadian Natural’s Chief Financial Officer, Corey Bieber, continued, “Canadian Natural has a balanced portfolio of high quality assets and our cash flow remains robust which helps us deliver value to our shareholders in any commodity price cycle. As we anticipated, the industry saw a tightening of both heavy crude oil differentials and Brent-WTI differentials after the first quarter of 2013, which is resulting in more favorable price realizations for Canadian Natural.Returning funds to the Company’s shareholders is an important part of our balanced approach to capital allocation along with continued production growth and development of our high quality, long life assets. Dividends have grown for 13 consecutive years and, when combined with share repurchases, represent a 38% compound annual growth rate in funds returned to shareholders since 2008.

In 2013, year to date, we have purchased 2,965,700 common shares under the Normal Course Issuer Bid at a weighted average price of USD32.12 per common share.”