Rising costs and low returns are testing Australia’s gas players

The country’s major energy firms are looking further afield for growth

Shell warned in June that rising costs and low returns mean only “a fraction” of the large liquefied natural gas (LNG) export projects in Australia and elsewhere will actually get built. Offshore Australia, Shell will hook-up the world’s first floating LNG (FLNG) liquefaction vessel, named Prelude, the largest maritime vessel ever built. But this hasn’t prevented the Anglo-Dutch supermajor from warning that other mega-projects, which once promised big returns, will struggle to move forward. “There is always so much talk about these big LNG projects around the world, but only a small fraction of them will get built,” Matthias Bichsel, Shell’s director of projects and technology told Reuters i