LNG

Woodside Energy, the leading Australian oil and gas company and LNG operator in the state of Western Australia, has criticised Federal Government moves to intervene in the Australian natural gas market, including with the imposition of price caps, and said the action was likely to make matters worse.

The Australian Government has concluded an agreement with the East Coast LNG exporters in Queensland to ensure that uncontracted gas held by the three export plants in the state would first be offered to the domestic market before being offered to international customers.

Nov 24 (LNGJ) - Australian LNG plant operator Santos said it welcomed the approval by the Federal Environment Ministry of the Narrabri Gas Project in New South Wales and will now embark on a 12-18 month appraisal program ahead of a final investment decision. Adelaide-based Santos operates the Gladstone LNG plant in Queensland and has a stake in Darwin LNG and the export facility in Papua New Guinea. The Narrabri project is for coal seam gas development with around 850 wells planned.

   Santos Chief Executive Kevin Gallagher said the conditions on the Narrabri Gas Project approval were consistent with those already set by the New South Wales Independent Planning Commission and generally in line with those for the company's Gladstone LNG operations, where Santos operates safely and efficiently, while protecting water resources and the environment. “Santos is excited about the prospect of developing the Narrabri Gas, a 100 percent domestic gas project that will deliver the lowest-cost source of gas for NSW customers,” added the CEO.

Papua New Guinea’s liquefied natural gas expansion seems to have moved to the back of the line for ventures likely to make progress in the next two years as its hold-ups came before the most recent industry challenges led companies to defer multiple projects.

Australian liquefied natural gas plant operator Santos reports progress on a coal-seam gas project in northwest New South Wales with up to 850 wells and which the Adelaide-based company said would be less expensive than LNG imports to meet gas shortages.

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Australian Industrial Energy and two Japanese partners building the first Australian liquefied natural gas import terminal at Port Kembla to bring in shipments of LNG for the state of New South Wales by 2020 have received their first firm order at oil-linked prices.

AIE, part of the Minderoo investment and mining group, has joined with Japanese companies Marubeni Corp. and JERA Co. Inc. to develop an LNG import facility near Sydney to make up domestic natural gas shortfalls during peak demand periods on the southeast Coast.

The Port Kembla floating import terminal joint venture said the first order had come from EnergyAustralia, the nation’s third-largest utility.

Port Kembla is an existing industrial cargo port with man-made breakwaters about 100 kilometres south of Sydney in the Illawarra region.

The Port Kembla terminal will initially handle around 2 million tonnes per annum of LNG.

AIE said it had agreed to supply 15 petajoules a year of natural gas, or around 400 million cubic metres, to EnergyAustralia over five years starting from January 2021 at oil-linked prices.

Analysts said this was more lucrative for the sellers at a time of solid oil prices over $70 a barrel rather than natural gas benchmarks such as the Henry Hub used in US LNG sales deals.

“It’s an agreement that provides their business with certainty in the face of increasingly challenging domestic gas market supply,” said Stuart Johnston, Chief Executive of the AIE subsidiary, Squadron Energy.

AIE is seeking to secure customers before making a final investment decision on the A$250 million (US$170 million) project.

The NSW Government has already given planning approval for the AIE-led venture comprising a floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU), a wharf infrastructure and a pipeline to connect to the existing NSW East Coast gas network.

The Port Kembla project believes that once operational, the terminal could supply 70 percent of the state's annual gas demand and help to ease the cost of energy bills for the 33,000 businesses and a million households in NSW that depend on natural gas.

The project is led by the Minderoo group, controlled by Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest.

Marubeni, a long-standing global LNG market participant, is also taking part along with JERA, now the largest Japanese utility company after being formed as part of a merger between many assets owned by Tokyo Electric Power Co. and Chubu Electric.

The choice of Port Kembla was the result of a joint feasibility study launched in February 2018 when the joint venture was first established.

The LNG terminal is regarded as a lower-cost alternative to a proposed Australian inter-state pipeline from West to East at a cost of around A$5 billion.

At least two other LNG regasification ventures are moving forward in NWS and in the southeast state of Victoria.

Australian Industrial Energy and two Japanese partners have advanced with plans for the first Australian liquefied natural gas import terminal at Port Kembla to bring in shipments of LNG for the state of New South Wales by 2020.

ExxonMobil, whose main Australian LNG stake is in Gorgon LNG in Western Australia, said it was planning to increase its presence in the domestic market by developing the West Barracouta natural gas field in the Bass Strait between the southern Australian states of Victoria and Tasmania.

Santos Chief Executive Kevin Gallagher said the Australian energy and LNG production company was committed to boosting Cooper Basin production and working with domestic industry to deliver competitively priced natural gas as it signed another wholesale agreement.