YPF official says Argentina expects to export gas

Argentina expects to export natural gas in the near future because of production growth from the Vaca Muerta formation in Neuquén province, an executive with the state-controlled exploration and production company YPF said at the World Gas Conference today.

Marcos Browne, executive vice president at YPF, said the company has drilled over 225 horizontal wells in the shale-prone play. At the end of the first quarter the producer had drilled more than 600 total wells in the region. YPF has partnered with Chevron in the Loma Campana area of the play in recent years.

Argentina is developing markets for gas in the country and plans to export to neighboring countries as the next step, he said. The country has recently imported conventional gas from Bolivia and regasified LNG from Chile.

Browne added that Argentina will ultimately be on a path similar to that of the United States, exporting LNG from a liquefaction terminal that has yet to be built. Argentina has two import terminals now, at Bahia Blanca and Escobar, but domestic production has cut the need for LNG. Ieasa, the state-run power company that handles LNG imports, said it plans to receive 58 LNG cargoes this year, down from 68 in 2017.

Browne did not expect to eliminate LNG imports entirely in the near term. Instead, he foresaw Argentina as an exporter to the Northern Hemisphere during its winter, when demand in the south is low.

Browne said at a panel on worldwide shale resources that Vaca Muerta is the second-largest shale field in the world, with 200-300 years of resources.

The US Energy Information Administration has estimated that Argentina has 801.5 Tcf (22,705 bn m3) of unproved, technically recoverable wet shale gas. A 2015 EIA report said the country has "world-class shale gas and shale oil potential," primarily in the Neuquén basin, and additional shale resources exist in three other untested basins.