thoughts on csg and energy for the future, page-10

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I'm still burning a carbon lite candle for Yaq's Gas Rush 2. ESG will be central.

The Queensland approvals are in place or imminent, the proponents have their base supply in place. The easy part is over, now for the hard part.

If you've been following Woodside you'll know they've announced the third Pluto budget blow-out.

As David Knox and Catherine Tanna approach their offices each morning, they have to put their shoulder to the door and push. It?s a tight squeeze in there because of the two enormous trunked mammals occupying the space.

The first is the execution risk associated with bringing these massive projects in on time and on budget.

The second elephant their all pretending to ignore is the shortfall in reserves.

The elephant taking up all the space right now is development and construction. Both upstream and downstream.

Commencing site prep and construction at Curtis along with getting field development and pipelines underway are surely their most immediate imperatives. It's an enormous planning, co-ordination and logistical exercise.

When it comes to the order of priority DK and CT can afford to ignore the shortfall elephant for moment because shes in good hands with ESG and others doing the job for them.

ESG and the other players are all busy proving up reserves and getting approvals for field development and pipelines for delivery to market.

GLNG and BG will maintain a watching brief on ESG and the likes and will be quietly cheering when reserve upgrades and approvals come in. Certainly they will have plans and strategies in place to secure further supply or launch takeovers.

For now though, I think their quite happy for ESG and others to press on while they focus on getting development and construction off to a good start.

Things will heat up when ESG emerges as a 2P heavy woolly mammoth in August with tusks extending all the way to Queensland and Newcastle. DK will be forced to bring the cantankerous beast into the fold.

I'm expecting ESG's big pointy tusks will be poking into all sorts of uncomfortable places.

Gas Rush 2 will only need one catalyst in the form of a GSA, farm-in or takeover.