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Australian gas industry looks for policy repairs to increase financial investment

Australia's natural gas industry executives are looking for more steps to bring back an investment environment they say has been damaged by a series of state interventions to boost domestic supply and curb skyrocketing energy prices.

While most executives at the Australian Energy Manufacturers Conference in Perth were broadly in favour of the Australia Future Gas strategy unveiled by the federal government this month, they required instant action and improvements to the policy to avoid new gas supply deficiencies.

If you take a look at some of the policy modifications that have occurred over the past couple of years, there are things that are, in lots of methods, deteriorating Australia's competitiveness, said Meg O'Neill, Chief Executive Officer & & Handling Director, Woodside Energy.

Woodside was locked in a drawn-out disagreement with employees last year over wages and working conditions. Though big scale strikes were prevented, the general public nature of the standoff sent out global gas prices skyrocketing and raised concerns over the reliability of the country, in 2015's second-largest exporter of liquefied gas (LNG), as a constant fuel supplier.

The labour environment is a really challenging one, and getting more difficult in time, O'Neill told the conference.

Shell Australia's nation head Cecile Wake said the Future Gas technique talks a lot about the need to avoid gas deficiencies, but the industry was not seeing concrete policies that promote the development of brand-new supplies.

We have ... long standing policies that simply are no longer actually fit for function, and what we need is for them to be reformed so that we get everybody pointing in the exact same direction, Wake informed on the sidelines of the conference.

The Future Gas strategy followed the federal government dealt with criticism for its range of short-term measures to enhance domestic gas supply and lower soaring energy rates, such as price caps and export limitations from the country's 3 east coast projects.

Saul Kavonic, an energy expert at MST Marquee, said the industry was delighted to see the federal government acknowledging the importance of gas, however was waiting to see if actions would follow words.

A great deal of damage has actually been done to Australia's track record for financial investment for gas business and trade partners. One file is the initial step, however not resolving it, Kavonic stated.

Wake said Shell looks at a sustainable competitive benefit, strong customer need and steady fiscal and federal government policy support while looking for locations to invest.

Historically, Australia might tick all three of those unquestionably. The last number of years, it has actually been more difficult on the 3rd box, she stated.

(source: Reuters)