Oil boom excites but leaves Australia with a touch of gas

Just when Australia needs its oil industry to foil the effects of rising prices in the balance of payments, the industry is spluttering and finding it hard to attract major investment. The reality Australia faces is that we have spent the best part of our oil inheritance in the years of low prices between the Iranian revolution and the rise of China a year or two ago.

Australian oil production peaked around 2001 and has been on the slide ever since, with a dramatic effect on our balance of payments.

..”Australia is gas prone, not oil prone,” Deutsche analyst John Hirjee says. That means explorers are far more likely to find gas than oil, and that is a problem. Australia has far more gas than it can use and so developing new fields is difficult.

The Age