The business model developed with TechnipFMC, Add Energy and Modec promises to cut up to five years of development time for a potential new FLNG opportunity.

 

Energy News revealed exclusively last month ahead of the Good Oil conference in Perth - where Transborders announced itself to the local junior exploration investment patch - its plans to sanction by 2021 a plan to use emerging but proven technologies to develop stranded gas.

 

Transborders founder Daein Cha, who used to manage Tokyo Gas' LNG trading and procurement division and upstream business development arm, told Energy News last month that first gas was slated for the mid-2020s, when the current LNG glut is widely forecast to open up.

 

Cha said at the time that he and his colleagues - who include ex-Texaco and CompactGTL development director Chris Hopper and former Mitsui & Co and Rio Tinto executive Jack Sato - was "looking at Australia" for the plan.

 

However, Energy News has now learned that the first field to be targeted will be offshore Australia, with the field to be confirmed early next year and production of gas potentially expected to start in 2020.

 

This represents an even faster schedule than originally planned, after which time the model will be available globally.

 

Norwegian firm Add Energy, which has welcomed Transborders to share office space in its Perth branch, will announce plans next week to develop a small-scale FLNG ship carrying up to 1 million tonnes a year to extract gas from small fields containing between 500 billion and 2 trillion cubic feet of gas.

 

Cost issues and economics currently prohibit commercialising such fields thus far using the more common large-scale and expensive FLNG vessels on them such as those used by Petronas and Shell, and also previously considered by Woodside Petroleum for its undeveloped Browse opportunity.

 

The new business model is set to cut out up to five years of work normally spent on identifying a gas field, understanding its size and creating a bespoke development plan. 

 

Yet the model is also about using fields that fit the pre-existing plan, not finding a field and creating a plan to suit it.

 

The partners are eyeing the International Energy Agency's forecast that energy demand will rise by 30% to 2040, with natural gas demand growing by 50% over that time.

 

While there is a global oversupply of gas currently, some pundits expect that to turn into a shortage as early as 2020 due of demand growth globally, specifically in Asia. 

 

Therefore quicker extraction models are needed than the current long term projects allow to meet the future demand for gas.