Australian Financial Review: Floating LNG is the Future

Australia pioneered the industry of freezing pure methane to make liquid natural gas (LNG) for the Asian market.

Now we need to embrace floating LNG (FLNG) and the jobs and innovation that comes with maritime engineering excellence, just as we embraced floating oil production in the Timor Sea in the 1980s.

Shell’s Prelude project off Western Australia’s coast is the world’s largest floating platform – and provides Australia with a golden opportunity to use innovation to drive jobs and productivity in our LNG industry.

FLNG could be cheaper to build than conventional plants and it could get built up to a year faster than its ­conventional cousins, it could give rise to a new industry.

Cheaper to build, faster to market; FLNG obviates the need for costly and lengthy pipelines, the construction and eventual decommissioning of onshore plant and associated harbour facilities.

Our LNG industry is facing cost and productivity threats to our ability to grow the industry while once ­comfortable buyer-seller relationships are under pressure. Australia needs to spread our risk as a world-leading LNG supplier, or face our vast but remote gas resources stranded.

It was reported by EnergyQuest that existing east coast LNG facilities had little prospect of further expansion.

This was confirmed recently by Grant King of Origin who said: “APLNG itself won’t grow, the resource upside means it will just run longer and longer.” MORE