Statoil may take the lead on shale gas projects and is considering investments in China to tap demand in the world’s fastest growing major economy, Chief Executive Officer Helge Lund said.
Norway’s largest oil and gas company in 2008 bought a stake in U.S. gas shale areas from Chesapeake Energy Corp., which it added to this year, and it now has people working with the U.S. company to gain knowledge of how to extract the fuel. Resources are also in place in China for a potential expansion there, Lund said today in an interview in Stavanger, Norway.
“Over time, we would also like to be operator on that type of resource,” Lund said. “It’s important to underline that Statoil is not a financial actor but an industrial actor.”
The company is looking at shale gas globally and said China “could be an interesting place over time.”
“There are a lot of things that need to be in place: the resources need to be there, the fiscal framework has to be attractive, you need infrastructure and not too densely populated,” he said. “It’s early days for China, but it’s correct that a lot of the requirements are in place there.”
China, the world’s largest polluting nation, wants to triple the use of gas to about 10 percent of energy consumption by 2020 to cut oil and coal, which produce more carbon-dioxide. The world’s fastest growing major economy holds about 30 trillion cubic meters of shale gas resources, China National Petroleum Corp. said in its online newsletter Aug. 23.
