A Chinese company with natural gas assets in Alberta is pitching a new liquefied natural gas plant in Prince George that would rail the LNG to Prince Rupert in special ISO containers for export to Asia.
The Summit Lake PG LNG project recently entered the BC Environmental Assessment Office (EAO) review process. The developers propose a new inland LNG plant that would produce up to 2.7 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) of liquefied natural gas, which is a little larger in production capacity to the Woodfibre LNG project in Squamish.
And like the Woodfibre LNG project, it would use electric drive, which reduces the LNG process's greenhouse gas emission intensity.
The company behind the project, JX LNG Canada, is an Alberta-based subsidiary of Changchun Jixing New Energy Ltd., which is involved in the LNG and compressed natural gas sector in northeastern China.
Binyou Dai, JX LNG Canada’s chief operating officer, told BIV News that the company has upstream assets in Alberta for producing the gas.
The LNG plant would not need a new pipeline. The company would require an agreement with Enbridge (TSX:ENB) to use its Westcoast main line. However, upgrades to the Enbridge pipeline would be needed to increase natural gas volumes.
“As part of the project, an approximately 2-kilometre pipeline to deliver natural gas to the facility from the existing Enbridge Westcoast Pipeline main transmission will be built, as well as an approximately 6-kilomter powerline to connect the project to British Columbia Hydro and Power Authority (BC Hydro) green power at the Salmon Valley substation,” the company says in its initial project description.
The project is being proposed to be built in two phases, with 1.35 MTPA production capacity for each phase.
“Initial conversations with Enbridge indicate that, in order to align with the Phase 1 pipeline capacity of the current Westcoast Pipeline, a pipeline loop of under 40 km could be required upstream of Compressor Station 4A within the existing Westcoast Pipeline system,” the project description notes.
LNG produced in Prince George would be put on special ISO containers and sent by rail to Prince Rupert, where they would then be exported to Asia by container ship.
