The Syncrude Canada Ltd. oil sands upgrading plant near Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada, on June 4, 2015. The future of the Canadian oil sands is looking a lot more Canadian. Calgary-based Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. said Thursday it will spend C$12.7 billion ($9.4 billion), its biggest purchase ever, to buy Alberta oil fields and facilities that process the sticky bitumen from oil sands from Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Marathon Oil Corp. “At the time you see some of the majors pivoting to other assets, you see Canadian companies that are doubling down on the oil sands,” Kevin Birn, a director at IHS Energy in Calgary, said by phone Thursday. The deals come as West Texas Intermediate, the benchmark U.S. crude, falls below $50 a barrel. It’s also less than a month after two major U.S. producers had to remove billions of barrels of Canadian oil from their stated […]