The first act of reneging occurred in the 1970s when Japanese sugar refiners refused to take delivery of raw sugar produced by Commonwealth Sugar Refineries on behalf of Queensland's cane growers.

The second act of reneging occurred in 2009 when a small iron ore miner, Mt Gibson, encountered a Chinese steel mill that refused to pay the agreed price for cargoes of ore shipped over from Western Australia.

Once bitten should have been enough for Australian exporters when it came to dealing with Asian raw material importers who refused to stick to the terms of a contract.

Twice bitten, which is what the Mt Gibson experience represented, should have rung warning bells across the resources world that some customers, particularly those in Asia, see contracts in a different light to the way they are interpreted in the Western world.

Third time around is yet to happen but when The Slug was reading a particularly informative article about Chevron Corporation in the latest edition of Forbes magazine he was struck by two facts. The first was that Chevron was performing well, and the second was its boasting about its LNG sales contracts.

Consider these words about the Chevron-led Gorgon LNG project off the WA coast, and then think sugar and iron ore: "All that cleaner, greener gas has already been pre-sold under 20-year contracts to buyers in Asia at prices indexed not to low-priced American gas but to high-priced oil.

"Aussie gas fetches upwards of $US15 ($A14.50) per thousand cubic feet, more than offsetting transportation and processing costs. Natural gas in America goes for $US3.50."

Two quick points. The US price has risen to $US3.81 since the story was written a few weeks ago, and not everyone gets the $US15 per thousand cubic feet mentioned.

But behind the story is a theme that has a ring of history to it and a time when Japanese sugar mills were trapped in high-priced contracts that then-Queensland premier John Bjelke-Petersen insisted on being enforced for the good of marginal seats in the Queensland parliament and a time when Mt Gibson tried to enforce a high-priced iron ore contract with its Chinese customers.

In both cases, sugar and iron ore, a settlement was reached that saw both sides wear some of the pain, which reflected changed market conditions. The Japanese got cheaper sugar and the Chinese got a discount on their iron ore.

So, if that is the way Asian buyers of raw materials like to operate what chance Chevron, and anyone else for that matter, being able to bask in the rich cash streams flowing from LNG priced at $US15 per thousand cubic feet when the gas price is much lower elsewhere?

No-one, least of all the Asian customers for the LNG scheduled to flow from Gorgon in the next few years, will upset the apple-cart just yet. Far better for the grossly over budget project to be completed and for the gas to start flowing before complaining about the price - and perhaps even threatening to buy LNG elsewhere.

Right now, there are not too many sources of LNG supply that could replace the volumes scheduled to come from Gorgon, which is one reason for the Asian buyers to stay quiet though, as everyone in the oil game knows, the LNG market is entering a period of dramatic change, including:

• prices that will be more closely aligned to gas than oil
• new, potentially low-cost producers entering the market, such as US gas companies looking for markets for their surplus shale gas
• shale gas production becoming a potent competitor to seaborne LNG in countries such as China.

It is the changing outlook, as much as the Asian understanding of a contract being a very flexible agreement (rather than the rigid set of rules seen in the western world), which caused The Slug to think very carefully about Chevron's boast that it could get as much as $US15 per thousand cubic feet for gas when the going rate is less than $US4 for pipelined gas in the U.S.

At some point the gap between those two prices is going to cause problems for everyone, especially if a way can be found to get cheap US gas in Asia, which is what Japan is pushing hard for right now.

Australian LNG producers could face a haircut on their contracts. Investors in Australian LNG producers could take a haircut on their share portfolios, and Asian gas buyers could face a revolt from their customers who will demand a slice of the low-cost US.

Those banks that have made long-term loans to LNG producers on the assumption of long-term and stable cash flows to service that debt might be in for a haircut as well.