Canada’s gas exports retreat

Gary Park

Petroleum News Calgary correspondent

Canadian natural gas shipments to the United States dipped for the second year in a row after a run of 15 straight annual increases, the National Energy Board has reported.

For the 2002-03 contract year which ended Oct. 31, exports tallied 3.55 trillion cubic feet, a 4.1 percent drop from the previous year’s 3.71 tcf, which declined from the all-time peak of 3.84 tcf in 2000-01.

Even so, the 2002-03 year was still the third best on record and one of only six years to surpass the 3 tcf mark. For the final month of the sales year, shipments were 281.6 billion cubic feet, a sharp drop of 12.5 percent from the 321.9 bcf in October 2002 and continuing an 11.2 percent overall decline for the first nine months of 2003.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration expects Canadian net imports will hover around 3.6 tcf for the rest of this decade, before starting a steady downward path to 2.6 tcf in 2025, far short of earlier predictions of 4.8 tcf. The agency said the drastic revisions stem from projections about Canada’s natural gas production, notably coalbed methane and conventional supplies in Alberta, that have been developed by the National Energy Board and other sources.

Meanwhile, U.S. demand is forecast to grow at an average annual rate of 1.4 percent to 31.3 tcf in 2025 from 22.6 tcf in 2002.

For the 2002-03 contract year, Canadian producers raked in C$25.76 billion in revenues, up 54.2 percent from the previous year, despite an 21 percent increase in the value of the Canadian dollar against its U.S. counterpart. The federal regulator estimated the average export prices at C$6.71 per gigajoule, a gain of 61.3 percent from 2001-02, although the October export price eased to C$5.45.

Measured in U.S. currency, export prices averaged $4.98 per million British thermal units, up 75.4 percent from 2001-02.