Exxon forecasts LNG volumes growing 300 pct by '30
Wed Nov 3, 2004 06:35 PM ET
reuters.com
NEW YORK, Nov 3 (Reuters) - Fast-growing demand for natural gas coupled with limited supplies in regions like North America will result in a nearly 300 percent rise in liquefied natural gas volumes by 2030, a top Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM.N: Quote, Profile, Research) executive said on Wednesday.
Exxon, the world's largest publicly traded oil company, expects LNG volumes to grow from 16 billion cubic feet per day in 2003 to about 65 billion cubic feet per day by 2030, more than doubling its share of global supplies by that time, President Rex Tillerson told analysts in New York.
Interest in LNG -- super-cooled natural gas transported by tanker -- has grown in countries like the U.S. which face a looming natural gas shortage, since it allows gas to be imported by a means other than pipeline.
Indeed, LNG is expected to represent about 14 percent of total gas demand in 2020, Exxon estimates.
Gas imports into Europe, in particular, are expected to show dramatic increase, largely through pipeline supplies from the Russia/Caspian region and North Africa, although LNG's share is also expected to grow, Tillerson said.
Overall growth in world gas demand is expected to grow about 2.2 percent each year from now until 2030, with much of the growth coming from the developing Asia-Pacific region, Exxon said.
Exxon on Tuesday confirmed it was in talks to supply natural gas from its Sakhalin project in the Russian far east to China.
Russia -- one of the few regions left in the world that supermajors like Exxon can hope to tap into to boost reserves -- will have to provide "fiscal certainty and sufficient incentives" to attract large scale foreign investment if it's to maintain its share of global oil production, Tillerson added in his remarks.
Demand for Exxon's bread and butter commodity -- oil -- is expected to grow about 1.5 percent a year until 2030, also spurred mainly by growth in the Asia-Pacific region, the company estimates.
© Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved. |
