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Milei’s Argentina is fast becoming the Texas of Latin AmericaMAY...

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birdman29

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09/05/24

09:16

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Originally posted by birdman29: ↑

Looks like Gas is now the New Green after all ...

Labor steps on the gas to fuel its climate targets
ByDavid CroweandMike Foley
May 8, 2024 — 10.31pm

New gas projects will gain stronger federal support in a Labor pledge to deliver affordable gas to customers for decades to come, as it warns of shortages within four years unless the nation boosts supply.
The federal government will back the case for new gas fields and import terminals to secure the supplies despite calls to phase out the use of fossil fuels, setting up a clash with the Greens and environmental groups over the new plan.
The Albanese government says new gas supply is crucial to transition to net zero emissions.CREDIT:AP
The future gas strategy, to be released by Resources Minister Madeleine King on Thursday, says the new supplies are fundamental to the economic transition to net zero emissions and the industries in the government’s “made in Australia” agenda for next week’s federal budget.
An official report to support the strategy says Australia could fill the future shortfalls by opening new gas fields such as Scarborough, being developed by Woodside off the Western Australian coast, and Narrabri, being developed by Santos in northern NSW.

“Ensuring Australia continues to have adequate access to reasonably priced gas will be key to delivering an 82 per cent renewable energy grid by 2030, and to achieve our commitment to net zero emissions by 2050,” King said.
While Labor often rubbished the Coalition’s support for fossil fuels with its talk of a “gas-fired recovery” three years ago, the new plan names gas supply as crucial to the nation’s economic fortunes.
“New sources of gas supply are needed to meet demand during the economy-wide transition,” the strategy says.
Former prime minister Scott Morrison outlined a “gas-fired recovery” policy during the pandemic with a vow to open up new gas fields, including the Beetaloo Basin in the Northern Territory, but no new gas field has been developed in recent years.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese questioned the Coalition claims when he was opposition leader but broadly endorsed the use of gas, saying in November 2020: “The truth is that gas will play a role and should play a role in terms of firming up renewables and in other areas.”
Energy Minister Chris Bowen dismissed the Coalition gas plan as a “fraud” at the time.
Australia relies on gas for 27 per cent of its existing energy needs, as well as 14 per cent of its export income, but some Labor supporters as well as the Greens want the fossil fuel to be phased out by 2030.
The strategy mirrors the gas industry’s calls for new projects and endorses warnings from the energy market operator that new supplies are needed to avert supply shortfalls.
The government documents say NSW and Victoria will face shortages by 2028, along with other east coast states, while the shortage on the west coast will begin from 2030.

While the new plan does not force any change on state governments, it clashes with Victorian Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio because of her criticism of east coast gas producers, whom she has argued continue to export large volumes to international buyers.
“Gas companies in Queensland are putting their export profits ahead of domestic supplies. That has been the case now for a number of years,” D’Ambrosio said.
Victoria lifted its moratorium on conventional gas projects in 2021 but at the same time banned the practice of onshore fracking for gas.
The federal plan matches calls from NSW Premier Chris Minns and others in the Labor government for more domestic gas supplies, such as from the Narrabri field being developed by Santos.

The Future Gas Strategy will contain analysis of the future gas supply balance, which it is understood will reflect the Australian Energy Market Operator’s (AEMO) current forecasts.
ExxonMobil and Woodside’s 50-year-old Gippsland Basin gas fields inBass Straithave historically provided up to two-thirds of southern states’ gas demand, but are rapidly drying up. AEMO forecasts gas production in NSW and Victoria will drop from 363 petajoules in 2023 to 236 petajoules in 2028.
AEMOsaid in Marchthat the entire east coast gas market would be in annual deficit by 2028 unless new supplies are tapped, forecasting an annual shortfall of around 50 petajoules until 2032. The supply gap is expected to increase to between 100 petajoules and 200 petajoules from 2033.
Victoria, NSW, South Australia and Tasmania are at risk of domestic shortages on days of extreme winter demand by 2025 without more supply.
A combination of solutions is needed to plug the gap, AEMO said, including drilling new gas fields in Narrabri and offshore from Victoria, upgrading pipeline infrastructure or build special shipping terminals in NSW or Victoria to import liquefied gas (LNG) from other parts of Australia or overseas.

Fast-start gas plants will also be needed to back up renewables under the Albanese government’s cornerstone climate policy.
To reach its target to cut emissions 43 per cent by 2030, the government is aiming to replace coal-fired power and more than double the proportion of renewables in the grid to 82 per cent in the same time.
The massive rollout of wind and solar farms will be backed up by batteries and pumped hydro.
The government’s budget agenda will also include tax incentives to encourage investment into renewable energy projects and the production of critical minerals needed for batteries and advanced technology under its Future Made in Australia plan.

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Milei’s Argentina is fast becoming the Texas of Latin America
MAY 8, 2024
tags: argentina

By Paul Homewood

Could this be the same AEP who keeps telling us fossil fuels have no future?

President Javier Milei has flawless timing. Argentina’s shale boom has reached industrial take-off just as he embarks on his extreme libertarian experiment: a Hayekian free market assault on the delinquent Peronist state and all its works.
The long-suffering nation is swinging very fast from a costly dependence on energy imports, and a chronic leakage of hard currency, to the happier condition of net hydrocarbon exports. The prolific shale basin of Vaca Muerta is finally delivering.
After years of talk and many dropped balls, this arid expanse of northern Patagonia is suddenly starting to look like the next Texas, promising to draw in the serious dollars needed to stabilise the ruined peso and make all else possible.
.

“It is not the same Vaca Muerta of 10 years ago, and we’re only doing a fraction of what we could do,” said Horracio Turri from Pampa Energy.
The US Geological Survey estimates that the region holds the world’s second biggest reserves of shale gas, and fourth biggest reserves of shale oil. Drilling has begun at another shale basin at Palermo Aike in Argentina’s deep south, so the potential could be significantly larger.
“Oil is what will put Argentina back on its feet because it is going to be a very big source of foreign currency. We have to start thinking like a petro-state because we are a world player in the making. First we have to tackle our infrastructure problems,” said Mr Turri, speaking at the Vaca Muerta Insights 2024 forum.
McKinsey estimates that new fracking technology – smart drills, geonavigation, multi-drilling from the same pad – has cut production costs to $36 (£29) a barrel, an irresistible business in a world market with a structural price of $80-$90. It is the best low-sulphur light sweet crude. Gas comes in at circa $1.60 (MMBtu), low enough to produce liquefied natural gas (LNG) for export to Europe at competitive cost.
Shale oil output has quadrupled to 380,000 barrels a day (b/d) over the last three years, suddenly beating expectations, and tracking the Permian growth trajectory that so stunned Saudi Arabia, OPEC, and the old petroleum order.
The government target of 1m b/d already looks too modest, with wildcatters in Neuquén talking of Norwegian levels above 1.5m b/d as the potential peak.
“We think we can triple oil and double gas by 2028,” said Miguel Galuccio, founder of Argentina’s Vista Energy, which sank eight new wells here in March alone.
Horacio Marin, YPF’s Texas-trained chief executive and Milei insurgent, says he will make it his business to ensure that Argentina is generating $30bn a year in hydrocarbon exports by 2030 or shortly after.
“We’re doing this for the Argentine republic, and for our children. If we can bring in $30bn we’re not going to have any more exchange rate problems,” he said.
He is pioneering a form of ‘lean fracking’ based on the Toyota manufacturing model.
“We want the construction of an oil rig to be as efficient as the construction of a car. It gets rid of layers of operational bureaucracy and makes us extremely competitive. Not even the Americans are doing this,” he said.
Ex-president Cristina Fernandez Kirchner can only gnash her teeth and rail at the injustice of fortune, as shale technology and the global commodity cycle deliver nicely for her mortal political foe.
“Milei’s plan is not anarcho-capitalism, it is anarcho-colonial. The recovery strategy is now clear: it’s oil, gas, mines, and grains. He wants to turn Argentina into an extraction country for raw materials. This pre-capitalism takes us back to the days of the Viceroyalty,” she said.
Alternatively, it harks back to the halcyon days before the First World War when Argentina enjoyed a prosperous place as Australia’s twin in the British imperial and commercial system, shipping commodities to Europe. It was the best of times for Anglo-Argentine concord, culminating in Harrods of Buenos Aires, the only foreign branch ever opened abroad.
A century later, Australia still manages to leverage its resource and farming wealth into a high-tech economy of top tier affluence. There is no foreordained reason why Argentina cannot do much the same.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/05/08/milei-argentina-shale-fracking-texas-of-latin-america/
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