Monday, December 24, 2012

Learning from the London Olympics - The Science Show - ABC Radio National (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Worth a listen.

Learning from the London Olympics - The Science Show - ABC Radio National (Australian Broadcasting Corporation):

The environmental movement has much to learn from the success of the London Olympics in 2012 says Brendan May.

6 comments:

  1. The big news today is Chevron has bought in to the Kitimat LNG - but for us the big news is WOODSIDE ARE LOOKING AT CANADA TOO.

    http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/industry-news/energy-and-resources/kitimat-lng-closer-to-reality-as-chevron-to-buy-out-encana-eog/article6699799/

    "Chevron is the latest major energy company to descend upon the British Columbia coast, drawn by the province’s large gas fields and proximity to Asian markets. North-western Australia is only slightly closer to Tokyo than Kitimat, for example – and Kitimat is far closer to Japan than other significant sources of current and future LNG in Qatar and Mozambique.

    Other multi-national companies leading LNG projects in B.C. include Royal Dutch Shell plc, Petronas and BG Group plc. Exxon Mobil Corp. and CNOOC Ltd., through its pending acquisition of Nexen Inc., have both expressed interest in Canadian LNG exports. Sources have said AUSTRALIA'S WOODSIDE PETROLEUM LTD. IS ALSO LOOKING.

    Together, those companies who have made public their Canadian plans are pursuing up to 75 million tonnes a year of LNG exports – a significant volume relative to the 460 million tonnes of global supplies in 2011."

    The Chevron deal may not be the last for Kitimat LNG, however. LNG buyers often prefer to have partial ownership in both natural gas fields and LNG facilities as well. In Australia’s Wheatstone, for example, the list of minority partners includes Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Company, Royal Dutch Shell plc. and Kyushu Electric Power Company.

    ................

    PETRO CHINA IS ALSO IN THERE :

    http://nwcoastenergynews.com/2012/12/16/4066/petrochina-multi-billion-dollar-lng-buying-spree-canada-australia/

    PetroChina went on a multi-billion dollar natural gas buying spree Thursday, Dec. 13, 2012, picking up shares in operations in both Canada and Australia.

    In Canada, Encana, one of the partners in the Kitimat LNG project, signed a joint venture arrangement with Phoenix Duvernay Gas, a wholly owned subsidiary of PetroChina, to explore and develop Encana’s extensive undeveloped Duvernay naturgal gas holdings in west-central Alberta. According to an Encana news release, Phoenix will gain a non-controlling 49.9 per cent interest in Encana’s approximately 445,000 acres in the Duvernay play for total consideration of C$2.18 billion.



    Hours earlier, PetroChina agreed to pay $1.63 billion for BHP Billiton’s 10 per cent share for an Australian LNG development, known as Browse, that like the KM LNG project in Kitimat had been delayed by the uncertainty in the LNG market.

    THE IMPORTANT THING WITH ALL OF THIS IS IT IS A RACE.SHELL'S VOSER HAS SAID THESE FIELDS MUST BE DEVELOPED IMMEDIATLY OR THEY WILL MISS OUT.SAME AS JPP.

    "Reports say PetroChina paid a premium price for the Australian Browse natural gas project, anticipating that if it comes on stream, as planned in 2018, the current glut in the natural gas market will have eased and once again LNG will be a seller’s market."

    The Browse project at James Price Point on the north-western coast of Australia is facing similar opposition to projects in British Columbia, including some of the site’s aboriginal landowners and from some environmental groups.

    The opposition to the Australian Browse project, according to reports, reflects a split in the local aboriginal community.....


    [A] number of Traditional Owners, as part of the Save The Kimberley organisation, issued a statement which said there is not unanimous support for this site.

    In a signed declaration, Traditional Owners have affirmed that they do not support the imposition of an industrial site on their country and will legally challenge the authenticity of any agreements entered into by the Kimberley Land Council supporting the proposal.

    The statement said that “…many local Indigenous people are disgusted by the apparent abandonment of the established process put in place by the previous State government....

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  2. http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/energy-resources/Chevron+makes+deals+with+Encana+Resources/7741808/story.html

    There at least eight LNG projects announced or planned for the West Coast, with the Kitimat project being the farthest along and already in the front-end engineering and design phase. In October 2011, the National Energy Board granted Kitimat LNG a 20-year export licence to serve international markets. The current plans call for two liquefaction trains, each with expected capacity of five million tons of liquefied natural gas per year.

    He said it’s too early to speculate about a completion date for the project, though many analysts have suggested that — with LNG exporters in Australia, the Middle East, East Africa, and the U.S. also eager to meet Asian demand — time is of the essence.

    “It’s a race. There’s no question it’s a race, and Australia is currently winning the race,” said Reynold Tetzlaff, national energy leader for PricewaterhouseCoopers at an Energy Roundtable in Calgary in October.A feasibility study into an LNG facility on Lelu Island near Prince Rupert, B.C., has been done by Petronas and Progress Energy Resources. Work is now going ahead to determine timelines, costs and labour requirements. Petronas recently acquired Progress and had said if the federal government approved the purchase it would look to build a larger plant than had first been considered.Royal Dutch Shell PLC and three Asian partners — PetroChina, Mitsubishi Corp. and Korea Gas Corp. — have also announced plans to build a liquefied natural gas export terminal in Kitimat, B.C.Another proposal called BC LNG, owned by the Haisla First Nation and Houston-based LNG Partners, expects its first shipment in 2014.

    ......................

    Kitimat LNG was last year awarded Canada's first LNG export license by the National Energy Board, allowing it to export 10 million tons of LNG per year. The project is slated to begin shipping gas to Asian markets by 2017.

    Other Canadian LNG facilities are planned by Royal Dutch Shell Plc, Malaysia's Petronas, BG Group Plc and others, making British Columbia a rival to the U.S. Gulf coast, where nine projects have been announced and one, Cheniere Energy Inc's, Sabine Pass project, is already under construction.

    .......................

    Natural gas for January delivery sank 7.7 cents, or 2.2%, to recently trade at $3.374 a million British thermal units on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Analysts noted that thin volumes due to the Christmas holiday were adding more volatility to pricing.

    The current week of weather during Christmas is shaping up to be a chilly one. Commodity Weather Group, a private forecaster, expects the current week to be the coldest one-week stretch in two years, said Jason Setree, a CWG meteorologist.

    However, Mr. Setree said the outlook for the 11-15 day time-frame looked somewhat warmer compared with the forecasts on Friday for this period.

    "We could see some warmer conditions as we head towards the second week of January," said Mr. Setree, adding that the milder temperatures in January would be brief before becoming colder again.

    Monday's retreat reflects the market's continued skepticism about the prospects for colder weather this year after the mild winter of 2011-12 and after earlier forecasts this season resulted in more mild weather. Natural gas is used to heat homes in winter-time and as a feedstock for gas-fired electricity. When the temperature is mild, gas demand falters.

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  3. For Woodside and JPP there are more than a couple of things there to watch out for,not the least being: 1. They can build LNG onshore plants for 1/2 the price of Australian ones. 2. It is basically the same distance to Tokyo,Korea and the east coast of China. 3. They have a sh*tload of cheap gas to sell. 4. Wages are not as high. 5.More workers to choose from.

    THE GOOD NEWS FOR XMAS - FOR AUSTRALIA FLNG IS CHEAPER AND CAN COMPETE WITH THESE NEW PROJECTS,GOOD VALUE FOR MONEY.MERRY XMAS!

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  4. Chevron has made two offshore natural gas discoveries in north Western Australia's Carnarvon Basin that could drive expansions of its two large gas projects in the same region.

    The discoveries at Pinhoe-1 and Arnhem-1 are located further away from the coast than the oil and gas giant's Gorgon and Wheatstone liquefied natural gas projects in the Exmouth Plateau area of the Carnarvon Basin.

    The Pinhoe-1 exploration discovery well encountered about 60 metres of net gas pay.

    The Arnhem-1 exploration discovery well confirmed about 45.5 metres of pay.

    Advertisement

    Chevron has now announced 19 gas discoveries in Australia since mid-2009, Chevron Asia Pacific Exploration and Production Company president Melody Meyer said.

    "These discoveries in the Exmouth area are significant as they are located farther out from other discoveries in the greater Gorgon and Wheatstone development in the Carnarvon basin and indicates development potential in the broader region," she said in a statement on Friday.

    Chevron Australia is the operator and has a 50 per cent interest in the two permit areas, with Shell the other stakeholder.

    More than $160 billion gas already been committed to Australian LNG projects - representing more than half of resources investment - but has been marred by cost blow-outs including a recent $9 billion hike in Gorgon's development cost to $52 billion.

    ........

    "Chevron has now announced 19 gas discoveries in Australia since mid-2009"

    LOL haven't Woodside announced a similar amount of dusters in that time - and now they've given up.

    ....

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  5. Phase 1.
    2 Trains.
    4.5 MTPA each
    $3.76 billion - Sounds very reasonable - the benefits of having all those Import Terminals to transform to Export.

    Dec.28 (LNGJ) - Cheniere Energy said LNG engineering company Bechtel of the US would be paid $3.76 billion for its engineering, procurement and construction work on the transformation of the Sabine Pass LNG import terminal in Louisiana into a production and export plant. The contract work consists of building two liquefaction Trains and related facilities in phase one, each with a nominal production capacity of round 4.5 million tonnes per annum.

    .....................

    The Chevron and Apache Corp. deal on developing the Kitimat LNG project in British Columbia signals the official start-up of the Canadian LNG industry as a multi-billion dollar outlet for the nation's huge natural gas resources.

    ..

    Chevron Corp.’s entry into Canada’s liquefied natural gas space could be the boost the sector needs to kick it into serious competition with Australia, the dominant supplier of chilled natural gas to Asian markets.

    ..

    Chevron will focus on working with First Nations in the northwest in order to help the proposed liquified natural gas facility in Kitimat move forward.

    That was the message from a company spokesperson this week.

    Lief Sollid says the company plans on conversing with First Nation groups to relay the benefits the project would have on their communities.

    He also says the experience of Chevron in the global LNG market will help advance this particular project.

    "We have significant experience in building LNG facilities and in marketing the gas and building long term relationships with clients. So we bring that experience to the Kitimat LNG project and we certainly believe we can help move it forward."

    The Coastal First Nations have voiced concern about the planned natural gas liquefaction plant and export terminal and a Wet'suwet'en clan has led protests against the Pacific Trails Pipeline which would transport the gas to the facility from BC's Northeast.

    ..

    AND COMPARED TO A BAD SITE LIKE JPP,KITIMAT REQUIRES NO DREDGING - NATURAL DEEPWATER,AND NO BREAKWATER - NATURALY SHELTERED.

    ..

    Although complete financial details were not released by the companies, the original cost of the project was set at $3 billion.

    Summary
    • Feed natural gas will come from Apache's Horn River and Liard fields in British Columbia
    • Approximately 19 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of combined marketable / technically recoverable natural gas resources
    • Initial plant capacity of 5 million metric tons per annum (mmtpa) liquefied natural gas (LNG) output
    • Potential LNG capacity expansion to 10 mmtpa or more
    • Designated industrial area location
    • Design based on proven liquefaction technology
    • Lower greenhouse gas emissions through the use of hydroelectric power
    • Natural deepwater, ice-free harbor; no dredging or breakwater required
    • Close proximity to Asia Pacific LNG markets

    ..

    A few years ago this was going to be an import terminal!

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    Replies
    1. Woodside would be looking at this and thinking,"$60 billion + for 15 MTPA at JPP ???"
      Oh sh*t !!!

      Oh boy we gotta have a floater,and with the change buy a few of these North American export terminals.Hell we could double triple our money!The sky's the limit boys,now how in the hell do we get rid of that pain in the ass Barnett?

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