Ivanhoe Energy’s estimated oil sands resource increased by 81% at Tamarack Project in Alberta

Robert Friedland, Executive Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Ed Veith, Executive Vice President, Upstream, of Ivanhoe Energy Inc., announced that a recently completed evaluation by independent engineers has estimated that Ivanhoe Energy’s Tamarack Project, in the Athabasca region of Western Canada, contains best-estimate contingent resources of 441 million barrels of bitumen. This represents an increase of 81% over the best estimate announced in conjunction with the purchase of this asset in mid-2008. The new estimate would support a project with an estimated capacity of approximately 50,000 barrels per day for more than 30 years.

Lease 10 was purchased from Talisman Energy Canada (Talisman) in mid 2008 and has been renamed the Tamarack Project. It is the proposed home for Ivanhoe Energy’s first integrated HTL heavy-oil project in Canada. Tamarack is a 6,880-acre contiguous block located approximately 10 miles (16 km) northeast of Fort McMurray, immediately south of Suncor’s operating Steepbank and Millennium projects. The block adjoins leases held by ExxonMobil, Laricina Energy and E-T Energy. Ivanhoe Energy holds a 100% working interest in Tamarack and Talisman has back-in rights of up to 20% in Tamarack for a period ending in mid-2011.

At the time of the purchase, Ivanhoe Energy reported in its July 11, 2008, news release that independent reservoir engineers engaged by Talisman had estimated that Lease 10 contained best-estimate contingent resources of approximately 244 million barrels of bitumen, with low and high estimates of approximately 188 million and 313 million barrels, respectively.

The new Tamarack evaluation was conducted by GLJ Petroleum Consultants Ltd. (GLJ), independent reservoir engineers. This GLJ report follows significant analysis carried out by Ivanhoe Energy since the mid-2008 acquisition, including a) a detailed core description completed by Norwest Corporation, b) a petro-physical model developed and matched to the core data, and c) a facies analysis carried out and compared with analogue field performance data.

The new evaluation of Tamarack by GLJ estimates that Tamarack contains best-estimate contingent resources of approximately 441 million barrels of bitumen, with low and high estimates of approximately 320 million and 558 million barrels respectively, out of approximately 1.1 billion barrels of discovered petroleum initially-in-place.

Based on these recent estimates of contingent bitumen resources by GLJ, Tamarack ultimately would be capable of producing 50,000 barrels per day for more than 30 years.