Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA)’s $1.6 billion bid for Cove Energy Plc (COV) starts a race to develop natural-gas fields off Mozambique’s Indian Ocean coast that may hold more gas than Norway’s entire reserves.
Winning Cove would give Shell an 8.5 percent stake in a block where Anadarko Petroleum Corp. (APC) has found 30 trillion cubic feet of gas. Italy’s Eni SpA (ENI) has discovered even more in a neighboring area. Together, there’s sufficient fuel for the development of two $20 billion liquefied natural gas plants to supply customers in Asia, according to Deutsche Bank AG.
“We’re a natural partner in that project,” Shell Chief Executive Officer Peter Voser said in an interview in The Hague yesterday. “We are the global leader in LNG, so this is an interesting province for us to actually further grow.”
East Africa’s fields offer a fresh source of gas supply for China and India, the world’s fastest-growing major economies. Demand for LNG in Asia is rising at almost 20 percent a year, outstripping the pace of production growth, according to Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. Prices in the region reached a record in November.
Shell won’t be the last company looking for a way into Mozambique. India’s Oil & Natural Gas (ONGC) Corp. was among Asian producers considering a bid for Cove and a counter-offer remains possible. At the same time, Eni and Anadarko have both said they’re willing to sell stakes in their discoveries.
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