Japanese energy firm Inpex and French giant Total on Friday announced a huge $34 billion gas project in Australia, as Tokyo looks for alternatives to nuclear power in the wake of the Fukushima disaster.
Japan has virtually no hydrocarbon resources of its own and is the world's biggest importer of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to drive its energy-hungry economy, the third largest on the planet.
The project will see gas from the Ichthys field, in the Browse Basin off Western Australia, piped to Darwin, where it will be converted into liquid at a vast processing plant producing 8.4 million tonnes of LNG a year.
The figure represents more than 10 percent of Japan's current gas consumption, Inpex said, and most of it will be shipped to Japan, with about 20 percent being bought by a Taiwanese firm. (AFP)
↧