Canadian heavy crude benchmark Western Canadian Select at Hardisty fell sharply Friday after TransCanada shut its 600,000 b/d Keystone pipeline Thursday following a leak. Sources said WCS traded Friday at the January NYMEX light sweet crude futures contract calendar month average (WTI CMA) minus $15.90/b and at minus $16/b. Those levels represent a drop of as much as 50 cents/b from where the grade traded against the January WTI CMA on Thursday, which was the last day of December crude as the prompt month prior to pipeline nominations being due, sources said. “It is definitely related,” one source said when asked if the Keystone shutdown had led to the price drop. On Thursday, TransCanada said it had shut the pipeline after detecting a leak of about 5,000 barrels of crude in South Dakota following a drop in pipeline pressure. The leak occurred in a section of the pipeline about […]