Gas has been unleashed by Donald Trump in the U.S. and the richest Australian, Gina Rinehart, is following the lead of the U.S. President, possibly on her way to building a second fortune to rival the $50 billion she has already made from iron ore.
A political shift in the U.S., coupled with a surge in demand for electricity from artificial intelligence (AI) data centres, has sparked a boom in building gas-fired power stations with 80 new plants expected to start operating over the next five years.
The gas revolution should spread to Australia where Rinehart has staked out positions on the east and west coasts snapping up prospects ahead of a rush to secure resources which are expected to be essential if an affordable route to energy transition is to be found.
Critics, led by fellow iron ore billionaire, Andrew Forrest, are dismayed by the rejuvenated gas industry, sticking with a belief that wind, solar and other sources of renewable energy will be able to meet household and industrial demand for energy.
The difference between the two super-rich miners was on full display last week when a new gas investment opportunity started to emerge for Rinehart just as Forrest was signing a "fossil fuel non-proliferation treaty" at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland.
The "treaty" is the latest attempt by Forrest to be seen as a climate champion after his failure to mount a convincing case for his preferred fuel of the future green hydrogen.
It also follows slower than expected interest in nuclear power which a new study by Citi, an investment bank, has deemed "not close" to being affordable despite emerging "as a surprise AI-linked theme" last year.
Gas, if Citi is reading future energy trends correctly, will be essential in balancing power from intermittent renewables for the world to "get close to an energy system which costs the same or is lower than the one we have today".
The bank's report focused on a question which tends to get lost in the energy debate, costs, and the need to deliver reasonably priced energy "as U.S. and even European politics shift to prioritise consumer affordability".
Rinehart, with a gas business trading as Hancock Energy, made her first significant move into the fuel three years ago when she teamed up with Korean steel giant Posco to pay $900 million for Senex Energy which sells gas into Australian east coast markets from fields in Queensland.
Two years ago she made her west coast move, beating rivals to acquire Warrego Energy which owns half the promising West Erregulla gas project near the WA coastal town of Dongara which is at the centre of the Perth Basin that has been producing gas for more than 50 years.
Last year she struck again, paying approximately $1 billion for the Perth Basin gas interests of financially stretched Mineral Resources, cementing her status as the emerging leader of the region which sells gas into the WA market with a portion produced by a joint venture of Japan's Mitsui and the Kerry Stokes led Beach Energy earmarked for export via Woodside's North West Shelf project.
Rinehart's next gas move could come with a bid for struggling Strike Energy which is already a partner with Hancock Energy in the West Erregulla field, but which has struggled to attract investor support. Its share price has more than halved from 50c to 24c over the last 14 months.
The low share price and the loss of a bidding duel for Warrego which Rinehart won has sparked a management shake-up, including the resignation of long-serving chief executive, Stuart Nicholls, and a board-led strategic review which is being seen as a step in seeking offers for the company.
At its current share price Strike is valued at around $675 million, an easy acquisition for Rinehart even at double the price given the profit of $5.6 billion earned last year by her master company, Hancock Prospecting.
If she makes a move on Strike, it will be her fourth gas deal in a multi-billion process of steadily building a nationally significant gas business, first via Senex and now on the West Coast where deep drilling and modern gas extraction technologies are yielding rich reservoirs that early explorers couldn't reach.
Adding Strike to her gas portfolio will confer outright ownership of West Erregulla and an extensive area with exploration potential, but perhaps more importantly it introduces Rinehart to an old friend who did more than anyone else to launch her iron ore business, the Australian chairman of Mitsui, Sam Walsh.
It was 20 years ago that Walsh, when head of Rio Tinto's iron ore business (and before his short-lived term as head of the parent company), who convinced Rinehart to sign a joint venture with Rio Tinto for the 50/50 development of the Hope Downs iron ore mine which funded her next mine at Roy Hill and put her on a list of the world's 100 richest people.
Today, Walsh is chairman of Mitsui Australia and a member of the main board of the big Japanese company with the authority to speak with Rinehart about future gas project collaboration and possibly provide access for her to the export market.
Gas is also getting a better hearing at a political level in parts of Australia, especially WA where the Energy Minister Reece Whitby (who is also the environment and climate change minister) earlier this month said, "gas is good, for now".
At a national level, Resources Minister Madelaine King (also from WA) last year launched a future gas strategy which she said was "based on facts and data, not ideology or wishful thinking".
Energy shortages in the eastern and southern states has been edging towards a crisis for several years with the latest sign of trouble being a request from the South Australian Government to the Australian Energy Regulator to use two old diesel-fuelled generators for backup power in the case of an emergency.
Diesel is not only an expensive fuel, it is also a power source of last resort with the SA Government's request a measure of the desperate search for an energy solution having rejected coal and gas and after finding that a renewables-only approach doesn't work all the time.
At an international investment level, a sea change can be seen in the loss of faith in climate-focused funds with the Financial Times newspaper reporting that last year was the first since 2019 that more money was withdrawn than invested in climate funds.
Citi's research paper, written by the bank's Polish subsidiary Citi Handlowy, started by calculating the world's average cost for all forms of energy, including oil, coal and electricity, which was said to be US$45 per megawatt hour (US$45/MWh).
It concluded that the energy transition industry could deliver a better, as in low carbon product, "but has as yet failed to prove it can offer a system cost that is more competitive than this reference price".
"The need to do so is critical as U.S. and even European politics shift to prioritise consumer affordability," Citi said.
"How close is transition to being affordable?" the bank asked in a paper headlined "The strive for 45 and the role of cheap gas in energy transition".
Having dismissed green hydrogen as being a long way into the future and nuclear as not being close to achieving affordability, Citi concluded that it was only in Texas and parts of the Middle East where cheap gas in combination with high-output renewables (wind and solar) offered an affordable option.
WA and some other regions of Australia with exposure to high-quality wind and solar energy might also fit the Citi test of affordability.
Rinehart's drive to build a national gas business shows that she is determined to be in the box seat when Australian Governments recognise the difficulty of having an energy system based on renewables without gas backup.
For other investors, her moves on Senex, Warrego, and the gas assets of Mineral Resources point directly to her next move being a bid for Strike, a business which has admitted that it's looking for new management and perhaps a new owner.
