ConocoPhillips is “pretty well positioned” to be a major player in the U.S. liquefied natural gas (LNG) market in the years ahead, said a top-level executive with the energy company Wednesday.

“Qatar’s been big for us. We have one train announced. We’re working on a second train. Nigeria, we have good opportunities [there], as well as in Venezuela. And every day we’re talking about using our technology for LNG,” Jim Nokes, ConocoPhillips’ executive vice president of downstream operations, told the Lehman Brothers CEO Energy/Power Conference in New York City.

“We have one terminal [Freeport LNG] tied down in the U.S. for 1.5 Bcf/d. We have a second one that is in the works that looks highly probable, and we’re chasing another couple,” noted the executive of the Houston-based energy company.

“So from an LNG standpoint, we think we’re pretty well positioned as a company,” Nokes said. “LNG is big for us. We think we have a lot of opportunities in LNG.”

As for conventional natural gas supplies, he noted that ConocoPhillips’ biggest plays are in the North Sea, Southeast Asia (particularly Indonesia), the Mackenzie Delta in Canada and Alaska’s North Slope.

“We have huge reserve positions there [North Slope], and we’re working to bring all those to market.” A long-line pipeline from the North Slope to the Lower 48 markets is “certainly in the works,” but “it’s not a certainty by any means,” Nokes said.

The company’s exploration and production strategy is focusing on “legacy positions that will be with us for a long time,” he said. “These tend to be the big oil plays and the big natural gas plays.”

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