US Natural Gas Supplies Exploding Without Apparent End

Gas abundance is not limited to the U.S. The latest World Energy Outlook report by the International Energy Agency (IEA) released in early November basically threw the entire natural gas market under the bus by predicting the glut will worsen next year and last for 10 years, which will only fade gradually as demand rises strongly in China. _Chu

Chu Market OracleYou can follow US shale plays at the Shale Blog and at Shale News. One interesting recent find that was mentioned in the recently televised documentary "Haynseville", is that the already huge Haynesville shale deposit was compounded by another huge deposit discovered in a slightly shallower layer of rock. Haynesville's portion of the graph above may continue to grow as a result.

Something has to be done with all of this gas production, so for now a move is on to create LNG facilities for export. Export of LNG to the UK has already begun.

While several import facilities were planned and built (before unconventional gas even came into the picture) in anticipation of high LNG imports in the coming decades, the U.S. has very limited LNG export capability. That could be about to change.

There are two LNG export facilities announced this year--Freeport LNG and Australia's Macquarie Bank have agreed to build one in Texas to export 1.4 billion cubic feet per day of gas, and Cheniere Energy's will be on the site of its Sabine Pass facility to export 16 million metric tons per year. Both plan to produce and export LNG by 2015. _Chu

Besides converting the unconventional gas bonanza to LNG for export, gas to liquids may eventually become more feasible on the US mainland, after the departure of Salazar, Obama, Boxer, and the rest of the energy starvation reich.