Heavy and synthetic barrels weaken

The discount on Canadian heavy crude widened versus U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude on Thursday:

* Western Canada Select (WCS) heavy blend crude for November delivery in Hardisty, Alberta, traded at $16.00 per barrel below WTI, according to Net Energy Exchange. On Wednesday November WCS settled at $15.30 a barrel below WTI.

* Light synthetic crude from the oil sands weakened to trade at $1.00 per barrel over WTI, having settled at $1.50 per barrel over the benchmark the previous day.

* Data from energy information provider Genscape showed western Canadian crude inventories rose in September due to lower pipeline flows and decreased crude-by-rail loadings. However, an industry source also said stocks had since fallen in the first week of October.

* The government of Alberta, Canada’s main crude-producing province, has set crude production curtailments for November and December at 3.80 million barrels per day and 3.81 million barrels per day respectively. Alberta introduced curtailment at the start of 2019 to tackle pipeline congestion and support crude prices.

* U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude rose 96 cents to $53.55 a barrel, buoyed by comments from the head of producer-group OPEC that the organization could take action to balance oil markets and will decide in December on supply for next year.

(Reporting by Nia Williams in Calgary; Editing by Daniel Wallis)