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79 comments on Australian Natural Gas - How Much Do We Have And How long Will It Last ?
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79 comments on Australian Natural Gas - How Much Do We Have And How long Will It Last ?
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I think it is ominous that gas rich Western Australia is turning to coal for electrical generation. IMO gas baseload power should be bottom of the priority list as we will need that gas for a dozen other essential purposes. I note that several scenarios have 35-40 year depletion horizons. It would be interesting to contrast gas supply vs demand timelines for northern and southern Australia. Also whether biogas and coal seam methane could stretch the resource.
However the most urgent problem is reducing oil imports which suggests using NG as a transport fuel. Obviously trucks and buses that return to a depot should convert to CNG and this is happening. Poster Neil suggests a way that cars could daily commute on domestic gas and I think that would work out cheaper than hybrids. GTL has high capex and wastes some energy then again it won't require vehicle modification.
At present the assumption seems to be that all new gas is available for foreign sale. If Australia is to retain a large percentage and use it as an oil replacement there needs to be an official policy, not the current scramble.
For reference, domestic gas ie. piped to your house sells for around 2.1 c/MJ in the eastern states. Long term industrial supply contracts for power generation are being set around 0.6 c/MJ. If a industry was established to supply CNG for a proportion of the Australian vehicle fleet you would expect a retail sale price somewhere between these two numbers, say 1.5 c/MJ. This in turn corresponds to a petrol price of $0.49 per litre or a diesel price of $0.57 per litre.
This to me sounds like a pretty attractive alternative to oil based transport fuels. Even at home gas prices you could refuel at an equivalent of $0.70 per litre. Conversion of vehicles costs around $4000, but I am sure that this would be much lower if it was factory fitted.
CNG should be equally attractive for industrial equipment. I am currently engaged in convincing a prospective new mine developer to go down this route for the powering of his mining equipment.
I'll look at the east vs west discontinuity in the next (coal seam methane) post.
Biogas and CSM will obviously extend the life of east coast gas supplies - the question is by how much, which is what I'll be exploring when I look at how long the east coast supplies will last...
Gday Boof,
"...At present the assumption seems to be that all new gas is available for foreign sale. If Australia is to retain a large percentage..."
Don't forget, in the UK we have we have much colder winters and have burnt through a high percentage of our gas so we need yours:-)