Reuters: Australia's coal bed LNG export expansion plans falter

Confidence in Australia's coal seam gas industry, one of the nation's brightest economic prospects, has begun to flicker.

For the first time since energy firms kicked off $50 billion of projects to drill for gas in the region's rich coal deposits less than two years ago, there is a consensus emerging among industry executives and experts that plans are well off track.

Patchy drilling results, rising costs and a world-wide glut of gas threaten to jeopardize what could amount to more than $60 billion of additional investment in liquefied natural gas (LNG) plants, based on current project costs, and leave an industry that would be just half the size its architects once envisaged. MORE