When Premier Clark came out with her bold stance on liquid natural gas, many speculated how much annual revenue the project would bring.
Clark has stated the industry will contribute between $4.3 to $8.7 billion to government revenue each year by 2020.
Last week B.C. Ferries came out with plans to purchase three new vessels that it hopes will be powered by liquefied natural gas. Although this will involve higher initial capital costs, the overall life cycle costs will be lower.
As of mid-2013 about 138 billion cubic metres a year of LNG was under production, which will bring the total capacity to 500 billion cubic metres by 2018. About 86 billion cubic metres will be sold to Asia and 80 per cent is contracted for the long term.
B.C. Ferries’ interest in LNG says a lot about the overall demand for the product. We need the product at home as well.
With big-time players like Exxon Mobil Corp., the world’s largest energy company, aboard on the project to export LNG (a move that would produce one-third of Canada’s current daily production), it speaks volumes as to how profitable this project could be.
Gary Nagra
Saanich