How high is up?

Participants in BC’s LNG sector have yet to answer the question; 2 more extend list to 17 by applying to NEB for export licenses

Gary Park

For Petroleum News

Make that 17 - the latest count of companies entering the race to export LNG from British Columbia.

Cedar LNG Export, an economic development arm of the Haisla Nation, and Orca LNG, the Canadian affiliate of a Texas-based energy firm, have made their appearance by filing applications with Canada’s National Energy Board for export permits.

Cedar is seeking three 25-year licenses to export the equivalent of 20 trillion cubic feet of gas at a combined rate of 2 billion cubic feet per day.

The proposal to start construction in the 2017-20 period includes six docks extending from Haisla land in the Douglas Channel, which extends from Kitimat to the Pacific Ocean, for floating LNG vessels.

Six mobile processing plants would each have capacity to convert 400 million cubic feet per day of gas into LNG.

The application did not include any cost estimates, the source of feedstock gas, who would build and operate a pipeline from northeastern British Columbia gas fields and what, if any Asian customers have been secured, although Cedar told the NEB that discussions are under way with various industry participants.

There was no immediate confirmation from Cedar that the proposal is the outcome of the Haisla Nation’s apparent break-up with Houston-based equity firm LNG Partners, which disclosed in a filing with the British Columbia Supreme Court that it is unable to pay its creditors more than C$100 million.

However, Cedar said it is negotiating with Bermuda-based tanker firm Golar LNG to commission vessels at a Singapore shipyard.

The Haisla Nation has a long history of targeting LNG as an anchor for its business, employment and economic benefits strategy.

The Haisla have also agreed to lease portions of their coastal property for other LNG terminals, while allocating some of their claimed traditional territory to a third LNG proponent.

The Orca application, to export 24 million metric tons a year of LNG over 25 years - ranking among the biggest players in the British Columbia LNG contest - also involves building six floating liquefaction storage and offloading vessels at one of two sites in the Prince Rupert area.

Orca said it hopes to start exports in 2019, initially using only one vessel.

The company declined to identify potential partners until negotiations are completed, while options on securing gas supplies and transportation systems are still under review.

However, it said the expected participants in the terminal facilities, pipelines, floating liquefaction and offloading or FLNG units, gas supplies, off-take agreements, upstream investments and marine LNG transport vessels are “all Global 500 companies with the financial resources to ensure the development of their FLNG vessels.”

Orca said that “given the integrated nature of the North American gas markets and pipeline network, gas supply could potentially” come from gas deposits outside the Western Canada Sedimentary basin over the life of the LNG terminal.