Shale Gas Boom News

Energy.It seems that energy touches every aspect of our lives from heating our homes to ensuring that fresh produce is available at grocery stores. It powers our cars and allows industry to move products around the world. The connection between energy and risk to the maritime environment has been a growing area of discussion, research and analysis. The United Kingdom’s Royal Navy, within its Joint Doctrine Publication (JDOP 0-10) 5th edition UK Maritime Power, captured this issue superbly: “Fossil fuels and minerals are an important resource in the maritime environment. New deposits of oil and gas, as well as mineral wealth, are discovered under the seabed each year, and improvements in technology will facilitate future exploitation.

Woodfibre LNG, Canada's first liquefied natural gas export project, will be a "nice-to-have" fillip for the country's gas producers but does not signal the start of a west coast LNG boom, industry watchers said on Monday. Privately held Woodfibre LNG Ltd said on Friday it will start building its C$1.6 billion ($1.2 billion) project in Squamish, British Columbia, next year after its Singaporean parent company authorized the funds last week. It is the first of more than a dozen LNG projects proposed for British Columbia to get the final go-ahead, but analysts say Woodfibre is unlikely to herald an investment surge from other developers given the challenging economics of an oversupplied LNG market.

Milestone marks another ‘first’ in the Class Society’s history of serving the gas market. Cheniere Energy, Inc. has commissioned a cargo from the Sabine Pass LNG Terminal. Carried aboard the Asia Vision, an ABS-classed LNG Carrier, the cargo represents a milestone in ABS’s history of serving the gas industry, the classification society said. “The first export shipment of liquefied natural gas from Sabine Pass is a historic moment for the entire North American energy sector,” said ABS Chairman, President and CEO Christopher J. Wiernicki.

As the world’s economies search for sustainable, reliable, renewable energy sources, they are also more closely examining a range of fossil fuels to find the cleanest, least harmful of those to cut carbon emissions and improve air quality in the process. In the drive to cut carbon emissions, interest in liquefied natural gas (LNG) is growing. LNG is being looked at not only as fuel for generating electricity and heat, but also as a fuel for powering marine vessels, road vehicles and trains. With the recent development of abundant shale gas deposits in the United States, the LNG market is really set to take off. The common method for transporting natural gas worldwide is to liquefy it so it takes up less volume and can be transported in specialized LNG carrier vessels.

ABS, a provider of classification services to the maritime and offshore industries, has been chosen to class the world's first contracted series of very large ethane carriers (VLECs). The class contract for the ships, which will be built in Korea by Samsung Heavy Industries (SHI) for an Asian shipowner, represents another gas ship milestone for ABS. "We are delighted to have received the class contract for the world's first large ethane carriers," says ABS Vice President of Global Gas Solutions Patrick Janssens. "As a result of the shale gas boom in the US, ethane is developing as an exciting new market with great potential, requiring the development of new ship types. The contract is for six 87,000 m3 VLECs and available options.

Asia petrochemicals firms are building tanks and retooling plants to store and process liquefied petroleum gas imported from the United States, counting on a flood of supply from the shale boom to replace costlier naphtha as a raw material. Samsung Total Petrochemical, LG Chem and Royal Vopak are among a number of companies in Asia expanding import terminals or retrofitting plants over the next one to two years as they buy more LPG. The gas is used by petrochemicals firms to make a broad range of consumer and industrial plastics. Asian petrochemicals firms have traditionally used naphtha as a raw material. They are now switching to LPG because rising U.S. supplies have pushed prices below those of both naphtha and LPG from their main supplier, the Middle East.

Norway wants to let oil and gas companies drill in Arctic seas that were frozen as recently as the 1980s even though some climate experts say it is too early to trust global warming to keep the ice away. Russia is also showing new interest in the Arctic despite high costs in a region where governments are struggling to set safety rules after BP's 2010 blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, the worst offshore spill in U.S. history. Many companies, including ConocoPhillips and Idemitsu…

Timing, they say, is everything. Cliché, for sure, but BAE System’s strategic decision a few years ago to buy, invest and reinvigorate newbuild and repair operations in Mobile, Alabama, seems poised to pay off handsomely as the U.S. maritime market faces a historic rebound. As the energy profile of the United States changes, so too do the prospects for it commercial shipbuilding and repair sector, which virtually overnight has enjoyed an influx of new construction orders and general maritime business.

Capstone Turbine Corporation, a clean technology manufacturer of microturbine energy systems, announced the company's inclusion on Deloitte's Technology Fast 500, a ranking of the 500 fastest growing technology, media, telecommunications, life sciences and clean technology companies in North America. Capstone Turbine's President and Chief Executive Officer, Darren Jamison, credits the U.S. shale gas boom, tightening global emission requirements and businesses increasingly becoming more focused on reducing energy costs with the company's outstanding revenue growth. He said, "This is the third consecutive year Capstone has been a Technology Fast 500 winner.

The rising demand for cleaner and flexible energy from two emerging major economies, China and India, may keep the petrochemical market tight, although the shale gas boom in the US is disturbing energy markets around the world, considers the International Energy Agency's (IEA) 'World Energy Outlook, 2013'. Large differences in regional energy prices are set to affect industrial competitiveness, influencing investment decisions and company strategies. The extraordinary rise of light tight oil in the United States will play a major role in meeting global demand growth over the next decade…

A strong continuation in the recovery of LNG expenditure is underway worldwide, driven by a growing demand for natural gas. The new eighth edition of Douglas-Westwood’s (DW) World LNG Market Forecast expects that global capital expenditure (Capex) will total nearly $228B during the 2013-2017 period. The surge includes capital expenditure on base-load onshore and offshore fixed LNG liquefaction, LNG carriers and LNG regasification, via both onshore and offshore fixed import terminals.

Statistics suggest an industry shift to permanent positions accompanied by inflation in packages worldwide as recruiters attempt to stem the global skills gap. OilCareers.com announced that it has seen a significant rise in the amount of roles offered by recruiters in relation to unconventional resources in the energy sector. While shale gas owns the news agenda worldwide, regions such as Canada, Europe, Australia and the Middle East have also placed a focus on other unconventional resources such as natural gas, gas condensates, crude oil, tight gas, coal bed methane, oil sands and heavy oil reserves to help in meeting global energy demands.

OilCareers.com has  released statistics suggesting that staff roles offered by employers in the Gulf of Mexico have increased almost sixteenfold in the last three years. Statistics show that the margin between contract and staff positions that reflected an equal split in 2009 now reveal a shift to five times as many staff than contract roles equating to 80% of job types currently registered on OilCareers.com. This comes as part of a move towards longer term recruitment strategies to encourage experienced personnel to the area as highlighted by Pauline Redpath…