TORONTO (miningweekly.com) – Canada must act with more urgency to license and build facilities to export liquefied natural gas (LNG) to Asia or risk squandering the opportunity to competitors, CIBC senior executive vice chairperson Jim Prentice told the Canada LNG Export Forum, in Calgary, this week.

If Canada did not move quickly to take advantage of its "unprecedented" potential to be a global supplier of LNG, the country would lose out to competition from the US, Australia and elsewhere.

"Given the scope of the opportunity before us, and given the speed with which other countries around the world are rushing to get into the game and fill LNG demand, we in Canada need to push ahead with a much greater sense of urgency," Prentice said.

"There is a window of opportunity, and it is closing. If Canada is ultimately to win in LNG, we need to pull together and seize that opportunity before it passes us by."

He noted that momentum in the sector had slowed to a crawl in Canada. Two years ago, mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in LNG-related transactions were valued at close to $2-billion and last year, M&A activity hit $8.7-billion.

"However, so far in 2013 there has not been a single LNG-related shale gas transaction to report – and a number of opportunities haven't managed to make it over the finish line."

To get these export projects moving the industry would need to be aggressive and move with purpose.

He suggested Canada would have to establish a royalty regime that would promote the establishment of an LNG industry in Canada and help to ensure its long-term survival and success; ensure the country had sufficient skilled labour to build these facilities and pipelines under tight timelines; ensure the federal government adopted a proactive role to develop a coastal management regime that took into account the rewards as well as the environmental risks of increased West Coast tanker traffic, which would require a co-management regime for those waters, together with the province of British Columbia and the coastal First Nations; decide how LNG facilities in British Columbia would be powered; and resolve the contract standoff that had emerged between project developers in Canada and potential customers in Asia.

The country was also urged to better understand and move to address the competitive challenge that was being posed by the US.

Prentice believed the benefits Canada offers as a competitor - the energy infrastructure expertise and the stability of supply - positioned the country well to lead and thrive in the sector going forward.

"What's important today from the Canadian perspective is that the competition – the US, East Africa, Australia – is moving quickly to seize the Asian opportunity, and we need to keep pace.  The Americans are eager to get into LNG in a big and aggressive way,” Prentice said.

Canada’s Natural Resources Minister, Joe Oliver, on Thursday delivered keynote remarks at the forum, saying Canada’s plan for Responsible Resource Development was enhancing the country’s reputation as a safe, stable and environmentally responsible energy producer.

“As the world’s fifth-largest natural gas producer, Canada is also well-positioned to take advantage of the enormous opportunity to supply international markets. All of Canada’s natural gas exports are currently to the US, a country that will require less Canadian gas in the future.

“Therefore, we must reach new markets in countries that urgently need energy to generate revenue for critical Canadian social programmes like health and education,” he said.

This month, the World Economic Forum ranked Canada’s financial system as the safest and soundest in the world for the sixth straight year. The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development also revised its economic growth forecast, projecting Canada to lead the Group of Seven in economic growth for 2013.

According to the International Energy Agency, global demand for energy is expected to rise by more than a third by 2035. “There is tremendous complementarity between Canada’s need to diversify its energy exports and the Asia–Pacific’s need for energy sources,” Oliver said.

The Conference Board of Canada has estimated that natural gas production in Canada would add another $576-billion to the economy as a whole between 2012 and 2035.