Environmental activists from Greenpeace attempt to stop Chevron drill ship Stena Carron by swimming in the waters ahead of the ship in the North Sea, about 100 miles north of the Shetland Islands, September 26, 2010. (News Today) - Chevron Corp. said Wednesday that it hopes to advance the start-up of a $3.1 billion natural-gas project in the Gulf of Thailand to this year, in the latest step by the major U.S. energy producer to cash in on booming Asian demand for cleaner-burning fuels.
The acceleration of the timetable for the Platong II project from 2012 reflects rising Thai consumption of natural gas, said Jim Blackwell, Chevron's president of Asia Pacific upstream activities, at a ceremony to mark the completion of the project's main gas-processing platform.
Chevron, of San Ramon, Calif., is placing a series of multibillion-dollar bets on natural gas in the Asia-Pacific region, where growth in greenhouse-gas emissions due to a reliance on crude oil and coal is spurring governments to promote cleaner-burning fuels.
Natural-gas use in Asia's emerging economies, led by China and India, is projected to rise 65% to 463 million metric tons of oil equivalent in the 2008-2020 period, according to the International Energy Agency.
Many of Chevron's investments are focused on expanding its footprint in China, the region's largest economy, or developing trillions of cubic feet of natural-gas reserves offshore Australia that can be cooled to a liquid and shipped northward to energy-deficient nations like Japan.
However, Platong II will further entrench Chevron in Thailand, where natural gas already meets around a third of the country's electricity demand. Much of this supply comes from the Gulf of Thailand, where Chevron operates 14 blocks.
Thailand's economy has surged since the end of the global financial crisis, despite a bout of political uncertainty last year. Global demand for its exports has soared, and companies view it as an attractive place to shift production.
Chevron owns 69.8% of Platong II, which aims to process 420 million cubic feet a day at its peak. Output would roughly meet 10% of Thailand's natural-gas demand, which Energy Minister Wannarat Charnnukul forecast last month will climb 6.1% this year to 4.34 billion cubic feet a day.
Chevron's partners in the Platong II project are Mitsui Oil Exploration Co. Ltd. and Thailand's state-owned PTT PCL. PTT, the country's largest energy conglomerate by sales, will buy all the gas to supply customers, including its subsidiaries in the petrochemical industry.
Separately, Thailand expects to start receiving liquefied natural gas through its first import terminal, with an annual capacity of five million metric tons, in the second half of this year, said Kurujit Nakornthap, deputy permanent secretary at the Thai Energy Ministry.
“Its construction will be completed by the end of June,“ though the terminal in Eastern Thailand will likely operate at 20% of its capacity in the first few years, he said.
As well as developing its own reserves, Thailand is investing heavily in natural-gas infrastructure to meet future demand, including pipelines from offshore fields in Myanmar and a liquefied-natural-gas receiving terminal being built by a unit of PTT some 100 miles from Bangkok.
Elsewhere, Chevron is also targeting a decision on whether to formally invest in the $4 billion Block B natural-gas project offshore Vietnam by the end of the year. Last month, it advanced the between $6 billion and $8 billion deep-water Gendalo-Gehem project off Indonesia -- Chevron's single largest investment in that country -- by awarding engineering and design contracts.
Source : kompas
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