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The smallest of Japan’s six major trading houses, Sojitz is a minority shareholder in gas and LNG projects in Indonesia and Qatar, and now plans to invest independently, considering projects in Nigeria, Canada and Australia’s offshore LNG platforms, Sato said in an interview inTokyo Dec. 11.We need to invest in new assets and from here on we’d like to invest as ourselves, as Sojitz,” Sato said.

The 2011 Fukushima disaster has left most of Japan’s atomic capacity idled while gas’s share of the power mix this year climbed to about 50 percent, the highest of the world’s top 10 energy users. That’s led to an unprecedented shortfall in Japan’s LNG supplies through 2017 and pushed cargo prices to a two-year high, according to data from Tri-Zen International Inc., which estimates that the country has long-term contracts to cover 76 percent of its needs this year.

Annual demand will outstrip supply until 2017, when gas from new export projects in Australia and the U.S. boost Japan’s contracted volumes, Singapore-based research firm Tri-Zen estimates. Meanwhile, Japan’s utilities plan to build an extra 24,000 megawatts of gas-fired capacity, an increase of 40 percent, within a decade, according to government reports.

Traders Lead

Along with Inpex Corp., Japan’s top energy explorer, the country’s investments in new oil and gas fields are led by its major trading houses, which include Mitsubishi Corp. (8058), Mitsui & Co. (8031), Itochu Corp. (8001), Sumitomo Corp (8053), and Marubeni Corp. (8002) The five traders in 2012 pledged at least $30 billion to develop new gas deposits, according to company data compiled by Bloomberg.

Sojitz’s main involvement in the gas industry has been via its LNG Japan Corp. venture with Tokyo-based Sumitomo, which owns 7.4 percent of Indonesia’s Tangguh LNG, 4.4 percent of an oil and gas block in the the East Kalimantan project in the same country, and 3 percent of the Ras Laffan LNG Co. of Qatar……..http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-14/sojitz-sees-beyond-rare-earths-to-lng-solar-in-non-atomic-japan.html