Australia LNG says China shortlist due soon
Tuesday, January 15 2002 - 03:10 PM WIB
Australia LNG president Arthur Dixon said the short-list to supply LNG to China's first LNG receivals project could be released within days or weeks, but was likely to be announced before the Chinese New Year on February 12.
"I guess they will make the announcement before then and the negotiations will take place following their holiday period," he told Reuters.
Australia LNG was one of the competing suppliers invited to lodge bids in December to supply three million tonnes of LNG over 20 to 25 years, starting from the end of 2005.
"We have put in what we believe is a competitive, comprehensive and high quality bid," Dixon said.
Other potential LNG suppliers are believed to be Yemen, the Ras Laffan project in Qatar, Malaysia's Tiga project, Indonesia's Tangguh project in Papua province and the Sakhalin project in Russia.
Dixon said it was expected two or three suppliers would be short-listed before a final decision was made later in the year.
Final selection of Australia LNG would underpin a multi-billion dollar fifth production train expansion of the Western Australian North West Shelf LNG project operated by Woodside Petroleum Ltd.
The existing three trains supply Japan with more than seven million tonnes of LNG a year and a fourth train expansion due to come on-stream in mid-2004 will also mostly meet Japanese utility demand.
The other equal partners in the project are BHP Billiton, Japan Australia LNG (MiMi) Pty Ltd and local units of Royal Dutch/Shell, ChevronTexaco Corp and BP Plc.
China's first LNG supply contract to a new receival terminal in Guangdong Province could be followed by a second-stage contract for a further two million tonnes a year from about 2008.(*)