The Middle Kingdom is fraught with danger for inexperienced...

The Middle Kingdom is fraught with danger for inexperienced players like LNC. Their CRIP UCG technology is unproven in a commercial sense - 4 to 6+ gasifiers delivering scrubbed Syngas for downstream processing. Sure there is plenty of coal in the Middle Kingdom - most of it located in areas that are not conducive to UCG - lacking in H2O - poor overburden structures - no infrastructure and so on and so forth. Add in the way the Chinaman does projects - cuts corners to cut costs and you have a world of differing idealologies to take into account to get it all to work harmoniously. Good Guanxi will get you to the deal table, might assist in getting a project through the approval red tape but it won’t deliver a project. Effectively I see this as an MOU – to commence negotiations which will take many months to get to a definitive signed off agreement and JV document that’s workable. Then you have to put it all into action and that’s where, IMO, it will come unstuck.