Hungry for gas: ExxonMobil is wary about the rebound in global demand, but expects demand to increase by 4% per year until 2030
ExxonMobil wary of global gas appetite
ExxonMobil's president of gas and power marketing said there were signs of a rebound in global gas demand, but added there were question marks over a recovery's sustainability.
"Things have started to turn up, but the question is will it be a sustainable turn-up or will we get to a point when we go down again or stay flat for a period of time," Tom Walters, president of gas & power marketing at ExxonMobil, said yesterday, reported Reuters.
Despite the global economic downturn, ExxonMobil has not changed its investment drive, Walters said, which will amount to $25 billion to $30 billion for the whole group over the next couple of years.
He said that despite falls in demand for liquefied natural gas over last year, the market remains in balance, adding that the LNG market will grow by 4% each year to 2030.
ExxonMobil has stakes in a number of LNG production trains worldwide, including in Qatar. It has sent a steady stream of LNG cargoes from there to its new South Hook terminal in the UK and from next year is expected to have the Golden Pass receiving facility on the US Gulf Coast up and running.
Walters declined to comment on how much LNG ExxonMobil will send to the US next year. "It'll be driven by the market," he said.
Some LNG importers in the US - which has ample supply from domestic sources - plan to re-export foreign-sourced LNG to higher-paying markets elsewhere, making the most of seasonal price swings, though Walters said ExxonMobil is not considering this.
"That would not be an intention. We don't like to get into arbitrage play," he said.
He added that in the coming years, the big growth markets for LNG will be India and China.
ExxonMobil plans to build the TransCanada gas pipeline which would connect Canadian gas reserves with demand in Western Canada and the lower 48 states of the US. It would rival another potential pipeline which BP and Conoco Phillips propose to build.
Walters said likely only one of these pipelines will be built and that ExxonMobil would be open to joining forces with BP and ConocoPhillips in a joint venture.