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The tiger and the corner filling station may be the most visible symbols of super-major Exxon Mobil, but a look at the company's project development portfolio suggests that its future in both North America and globally is in natural gas.
According to a presentation by Exxon Development President Morris E. Foster at last week's Lehman Brothers energy conference, more than half of the projects in the works are related solely to natural gas.
The largest single segment at 29% is liquefied natural gas, primarily ventures in Qatar and Australia's North West Shelf, Foster said.
The next largest gas program is development of the technology to reinject highly acidic, sulfur-laden gas produced along with oil from the Tengiz field in Kazakhstan as well as in the Kashagan field in development in the Caspian Sea. This represents 13% of the portfolio.
Foster said Exxon had determined that reinjecting the acidic gas was the most efficient and environmentally benign means of dealing with the gas in a region that had little demand for natural gas and a global...