Page 4 - NorthAmOil Week 42

NorthAmOil COMMENTARY NorthAmOil
Pieridae moves closer to building East Coast LNG terminal
Pieridae Energy has completed the purchase of assets from Shell, which secures the majority of the natural gas needed to supply the first train at its proposed Goldboro LNG terminal
NOVA SCOTIA
WHAT:
Pieridae has secured the majority of gas required to supply Train 1 at its planned Goldboro LNG project.
WHY:
The company has completed the purchase of upstream and midstream gas assets in Alberta from Shell.
WHAT NEXT:
Pieridae needs to finalise the EPC contract for Goldboro before it can reach an FID.
CANADA’S Pieridae Energy has taken another step towards the construction of an LNG ter- minal on the country’s East Coast after closing the purchase of gas assets that will serve the pro- posed plant.
Pieridae announced on October 17 that the CAD190mn ($145mn) acquisition of upstream and midstream assets in the southern Alberta Foothills from Royal Dutch Shell had closed. The company said, in a statement that follow- ing the transaction, it now had an “extensive” drilling inventory covering multiple dry gas and liquids-rich gas reservoirs in the Foothills area.
In the first six months of 2019, the assets pro- duced roughly 28,634 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boepd), consisting of roughly 119mn cubic feet (3.4 mn cubic metres) per day of nat- ural gas, 5,656 barrels per day of natural gas liq- uids (NGLs) and 3,163 bpd of condensate and light oil.
The deal also includes three deep cut, sour gas processing plants – Jumping Pound, Caro- line and Waterton – with a combined capacity of around 750 mmcf (21.2 mcm) per day. The plants are currently operating with 420 mmcf (11.9mcm) per day of spare capacity. Under the transaction, the company has also acquired a 14% working interest in the Shantz sulphur forming plant, and around 1,700km of pipelines.
Pieridae welcomed the transaction as taking it a step closer to the development of its proposed 10mn tonne per year (tpy) Goldboro LNG plant in Nova Scotia.
“We are very pleased to close this transfor- mational acquisition, as it secures the major- ity of the natural gas needed, once developed, to supply the first train at our Goldboro LNG facility for at least 20 years,” said Pieridae’s CEO, Alfred Sorensen. “We will now complete our negotiations with Kellogg Brown & Root Ltd [KBR] for a fixed price contract to construct the Goldboro LNG facility so that we can then proceed to complete the project financing and final equity raise and make a final investment decision [FID].”
Competition
If the project goes ahead, Goldboro would be the first LNG export terminal on Canada’s East Coast. Pieridae is aiming for the project to com- pete with the growing number of liquefaction terminals in the US, with Goldboro’s location allowing it to supply gas to Europe at a lower shipping cost.
But while the US has raced ahead in building new LNG export capacity, driven by the shale gas boom, Canada has moved more slowly, despite around 20 liquefaction projects initially being
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w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m Week 42 22•October•2019