Minister of State for Energy Affairs and President/CEO of Qatar Petroleum HE Saad Sherida Al Kaabi stressed the importance of collaboration between LNG producers and consumers in order to achieve greater growth and prosperity.
In a keynote speech delivered remotely at the start of the 9th Japan LNG Producer-Consumer Conference, HE Al Kaabi highlighted the new realities brought by a number of geopolitical events and developments of global impact, and the consequences of an evolving pandemic. The conference was held under the theme, ‘Cooperation Between Producers and Consumers Post-COVID-19’.
According to Al Kaabi, it is not a secret that COVID-19 has disrupted many aspects of our lives. In addition to the agonising human toll, the virus has created painful realities that also disrupted the growth and prosperity, which all countries had hoped to achieve.
The minister also highlighted Qatar’s resilient LNG industry stressing that, during these challenging times, ‘Qatari LNG continued to flow to all markets, thanks to the outstanding performance of our teams and facilities, and to the flexibility we have in our global LNG portfolio, market reach, and LNG fleet’.
In his keynote speech, Al Kaabi gave an overview of Qatar’s journey to becoming the world’s leading LNG player and its expansion projects, and future growth plans.
In 2017, we announced our intention to increase our LNG production capacity to 100 million tonnes per year. Such target was then increased in 2018 to 110 million tonnes per annum, and again, as we obtained more data on the capability of our giant North Field, the target was increased in 2019 to 126 million tonnes per year by 2027.
As history has shown, we don’t expect to stop at 126 million. We continue to strive to develop our natural gas resources and lead the way in the world’s LNG value chain.
He added that they continue to move full steam ahead with the North Field expansion projects and expect to sign all remaining EPC contracts before the end of this year as previously announced.
The minister showcased the environmental efforts associated with the expansion projects including significantly lower CO2 emissions, carbon capture and sequestration, the use of compressed natural gas as fuel for transportation vehicles used during the projects’ construction phase, and the use of a world-scale solar power plant to provide the electricity required to support the new LNG trains.
Highlighting Qatar’s commitment towards its customers and partners, Al Kaabi said that despite the pandemic, they continue to strengthen and expand their cooperation with all existing long-term partners as well as with new partners across the world, providing security and diversity of LNG supplies.
I have no doubt that the best for the LNG industry is yet to come. And despite the stress that the pandemic has placed on national economies and the LNG markets, I think it is important to look at the brighter side: I believe that the economic and environmental realities of the post COVID-19 era will help increase the competitiveness of this cleanest of fossil fuels.
In closing, he said that the world will eventually win the battle against COVID-19, energy will continue to be central to global growth and development, and protecting our environment should be a guiding light for us all.
The LNG Producer-Consumer Conference is a global annual dialogue, launched in 2012 and organised by the Japan Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, and the Asia Pacific Energy Research Centre. It provides ministers, heads of international organisations, corporate executives, and other stakeholders with a venue to share the latest trends in the global LNG market and discuss opportunities and challenges with a view to its development.
Learn more about the conference by visiting their homepage at lng-conference.org.
