Coal Seam Gas In Indonesia ?  

The Jakarta Post reports that Indonesia is looking to become the first coal seam gas to LNG producer - Gas, coal to play bigger role .

BP had good news for Indonesia recently. It announced that it, along with Italian firm Eni, will start producing coal bed methane (CBM) from the Sanga-Sanga block in East Kalimantan in “a few years”.

It will be the first production of CBM in Indonesia. The gas will be supplied to the Bontang LNG plant located in the province and thus enable Indonesia to become the world’s first CBM-to-LNG producer.

CBM or coal seam gas (CSG) is natural gas that is extracted from coal beds. Indonesia is estimated to have a potential CBM resources of 450 trillion cubic feet, about three times as much as the country’s potential and proven natural gas resources, which now stands at around 165 trillion cubic feet.

The discovery of CBM by BP and partner underlines that Indonesia has much gas underground and, given its abundance, gas will become one of the primary energy sources in Indonesia, replacing oil, where reserves have fast declined over the past decade.

Indonesia, formerly a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), has been a net oil importer since 2004. The national oil and condensate production has dropped to about 950,000 barrels per day (bpd) at present from 1.4 million bpd in 2000, while the national oil consumption has continued to increase and now reaches around 1.5 million bpd.

Efforts aimed at increasing the national oil production haven’t thus far brought much fruit. Most, if not all, the country’s giant fields have been discovered, exploited and now see their production decline due to natural depletion of reserves. The biggest oil field to be discovered over the past decade is the Cepu block in border areas of Central Java and East Java, which now produces around 13,000 bpd of oil.