The natural gas industry's favorite public relations ploy about the necessity of hydraulic fracturing (fracking), the process through which "clean natural gas" is now procured, is that the patriotic gas industry is championing the shale gas boom for domestic consumption and for "national security purposes." We now know definitively that this is pure propaganda.
Enter the smoking gun, a 20-year $8 billion agreement signed between BG Group, short for British Gas Group, and Houston-based Cheniere Energy.
The deal calls for BG Gas to export liquefied natural gas, or LNG (natural gas that has been converted temporarily to liquid form for ease of storage or transport), from Cheniere's Sabine Pass LNG export terminal, located on the Gulf Coast in Louisiana, out to the highly profitable global market, chiefly in Asia and Europe.
Reuters referred to the deal as "a new chapter in the shale gas revolution that has redefined global markets."
The Wall Street Journal reports that BG is thrilled that it will now be able to "buy gas comparatively cheaply and sell it for much higher prices in Europe and Asia." The deal is just the beginning of a huge industry rush to export U.S. gas, according to the paper:
Energy companies in the U.S., Canada and Australia are planning or have already begun building more than a dozen projects to liquefy and export natural gas as they seek to capitalize on growing demand for liquid-gas imports. Asia is the hottest market: its demand for liquefied gas is expected to grow 68% between 2010 and 2020, according to advisory firm Poten & Partners.
