Gubmint is funny. From QLD’s genius bureaucracy:
On 8 July 2015, the Minister for State Development and Minister for Natural Resources and Mines publically announced the development of a Queensland gas supply and demand action plan (gas action plan) and released the terms of reference. This announcement came in response to a number of emerging challenges and the desire to develop an action-orientated plan aimed at maximising the gas sector’s potential, while balancing the needs of landholders, local communities and traditional owners and maintaining environmental safeguards.
Following this announcement, extensive research and analysis into the gas sector was jointly undertaken by the departments of Natural Resources and Mines, Energy and Water Supply, and State Development. Consistent with the terms of reference, this analysis sought to provide a clearer understanding of the state’s gas prospectivity and level of investment attractiveness; the issues and challenges facing landholders, traditional owners, communities located near gas areas and other stakeholders; the barriers to supplying gas (exploration and production); whether gas and pipeline trading markets are evolving to the benefit of the community; and the full range of opportunities that gas presents.
The analysis revealed that the Queensland gas sector has a number of strengths, opportunities, weaknesses and threats (refer Section 4 of this paper). In response, the Queensland Government has developed a number of reform ideas for broad stakeholder consultation. Following consultation feedback, the government plans to release the final gas action plan in mid-2017.
The reforms seek to achieve two core objectives:
1. improve the sector’s social licence to operate
2. decrease the barriers to supply.
The reforms seek to achieve two core objectives—improve the sector’s social licence to operate and decrease the barriers to supply (exploration and production). In developing these reforms, government acknowledges that the task of improving the economic, social and environmental performance of the gas sector will be a shared effort between government, industry and the community.
In relation to social licence, the reform ideas concentrate on improving community trust generally and specifically improving:
- >>how community expectations are met
- >>community understanding of the risks and management frameworks associated with gas exploration and development
- >>the collection of complaints, compliance and reporting of performance data landholder relationships, including land release
- >>knowledge of potential skills gaps in local workers and specialists
- >>procurement practices.
In relation to removing the barriers to gas supply, the reforms concentrate on improving:
- >the efficiency and effectiveness of regulation without diminishing environmental and social protections and safeguards
- >land release strategies
- >geoscientific data
- >investment attraction
- >technological innovation
- >access to gas and gas infrastructure.
The reform ideas acknowledge and accept both the current difficult market conditions and, given the 10-year lead times to develop gas, the need to plan now to stimulate long-term supply. All ideas are intended to assist the gas sector withstand the current downturn and put into place the necessary changes to ensure Queensland continues to maximise its gas endowment in the decades to come. The reform ideas will be subject to broad public consultation and their eventual implementation will be influenced by the expected benefits and the availability of resources.
Sounds rather like a plan for a major public relations assault to cover the fact that the state never planned anything around its LNG boom. Not to mention to protect the firms that buggered it up so royally. No wonder the lobby is so impressed:
The Australian Petroleum Production & Exploration Association on Monday said the Queensland government’s gas action plan is a recognition of the need for regulatory reforms.
APPEA chief executive, Malcolm Roberts, said that with the AU$70 billion investment in local LNG project, Queensland has become a world leader.
Roberts added that the state is in a position to supply gas to other states that have passed on the opportunity to develop their own industry, stressing the importance of Queensland gas with a possible gas supply shortfall faced by the eastern Australia by 2019.
“It is heartening to see the government accept the need to reduce the regulatory costs of doing business in Queensland, industry has already sharply cut its own operating costs to stay competitive in a depressed global market,” Roberts said.
Smaller explorers are facing high upfront regulatory costs and have a hard time attracting investment capital. However, smaller explorers play a vital role in finding and developing new gas reserves, according to Roberts who added that reforms in this area will push the industry to turn exploration into production.
He concluded that the government’s rejection of domestic gas reservation is welcome recognition that regulatory interventions don’t deliver reliable supply or put downward pressure on prices.
You’d never know that it is QLD and the cartel that are responsible for the gas shortages would ya?
Here’s the full “action plan” if you’ve time for a hair-pulling session of Kafka meets Orwell.
