Message from the President and the Secretary General

MESSA AND

GE FROM THE PRES THE SE CRETA RY GENE IDENT RAL

Dear Colleagues, At the time of writing, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the Novel Coronavirus, COVID-19, a pandemic, pushing the threat beyond the global health emergency it had announced in January.

We are hopeful that everyone has followed and is following the advice from the health authorities and your individual organisations. Beyond that, the effectiveness of the societal response to COVID-19 relies on individuals making wise decisions and showing care for each other.

We have taken the prudent decision to postpone the meetings of the Coordination Committee and Executive Committee, which were scheduled for April 21-23 in Prague, in light of the global impact of the COVID-19 outbreak. The health and well-being of the IGU community, as well as that of our local host community, are the priority.

Despite the current serious challenges, this year promises to be a very significant stepping-stone for the global natural gas industry and IGU, particularly, as we prepare to host the next edition of the World Gas Conference, in Daegu, Korea, in June 2021.

As we are approaching the final year of the Korea Presidency and prepare to hand the reins to China, we are pleased with the significant progress being made towards fulfilling the strategic plan set out at the start of the Presidency. We are grateful to have so many active industry experts actively participating in the 11 committees and three task forces of IGU, one of the key strengths of IGU’s vast network.

We continue to raise the Global Voice of Gas through our active engagement in the most significant global energy policy debates and fora.

Your IGU leadership team remains hard at work advocating for gas as a critical part of the world’s energy portfolio. At the same time, we are working hard to ensure that the value to IGU membership retains and increases its relevance.

Key developments

Let us turn to some of the key developments that took place in the last six months.

Last October a historic event for IGU took place, during the Council meeting in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. The Council voted to establish a permanent headquarters and to base it in London, UK. The implementation team approved at the Council meeting is now working towards completing the necessary plans to enable the move to a permanent headquarters.

Our most sincere appreciation goes to our host the Indonesian Gas Association for a memorable week in this beautiful city, which has played such an important role in IGU’s history.

In November of last year, we celebrated the 2019 edition of the Latin America and Caribbean Gas Conference in Lima, Peru. The event brought together high-level government representatives, regulatory bodies, national and international gas companies, investors and solution providers to uncover investment opportunities in Latin America and the Caribbean’s gas sectors.

IGU also hosted two side events during the UN Climate Change Conference (COP 25), held in Madrid during the first half of December. The first event took place on December 2, with the support of the Korean Delegation at the Korea Country Pavilion, and it focused on the environmental, economic and societal value of natural gas as a transport fuel. The second event was on December 12, kindly hosted by the Presiding Chilean Delegation at their Pavilion. We launched the fourth edition of the Urban Air Quality report series during this event, presenting one of the cases on a clean air panel, and highlighted Chile’s commitment to air quality and GHG improvement

through measures to increase renewables and natural gas in the country’s energy mix.

Another critically important global debate, where IGU continues to have a strong voice is that of methane emissions. As one of the original supporting signatories, we continue to be engaged and supportive of the Methane Guiding Principles (MGP) initiative and participated in the annual MGP Roundtable in January in London. IGU was represented by the President and the Public Affairs Director, Menelaos (Mel) Ydreos. This meeting reunites all members to discuss and agree on the work plan for the year. We would like to encourage everyone to continue the efforts towards better measurement, documentation and reduction of methane leaks. IGU remains committed to supporting its members in this important area.

Despite many challenges and difficult circumstances encountered by the IGRC2020 hosts, Oman LNG and the Government of the Sultanate of Oman, a great conference was held on February 24-26 in Muscat. This worldclass event allowed participants from 34 countries to discuss and share information on the technology and innovation developments that will ensure that gas plays a vital economic and environmental role in a sustainable future. We would like to thank our hosts for an excellent conference and their well-known warm hospitality which we have all come to appreciate.

Concurrently with the IGRC2020 Conference, and through the MGP initiative, an executive and master class training session was delivered to industry members from the MENA region. We appreciate Total’s kind sponsorship of this training session.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia holds this year’s G20 Presidency. A very ambitious programme has been developed under the theme of “Realising Opportunities of the 21st Century for All”.

The agenda of the Energy Sustainability Working Group (ESWG) is focused on the Circular Carbon Economy, covering the contribution of all energy sources to the four Rs of the Circular Carbon Economy: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Remove. In addition, the ESWG will address energy security and market stability for economic prosperity and to improve people’s livelihoods.

Menelaos (Mel) Ydreos, IGU Public Affairs Director, made presentations at the Circular Carbon Economy and Energy Security and Market Stability Workshops which were held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on March 5-6 and participated in the first ESWG meeting on March 7-8.

Coming soon

And now to the coming soon portion of our message! We are ready for the imminent release of IGU’s 2020 World LNG Report – one of the most sought-out IGU reports, delivered by the LNG Committee. Planning for the report release continues and is expected for late April/early May. You will be able to download it from www.igu.org.

Additionally, a number of other reports are expected to be released over the next several months. They include the 2020 edition of the Wholesale Gas Price Survey, a very important report on Technology and Innovation and the annual Global Gas Report.

The Korea Presidency continues to advance the WGC 2021 organisational work. In addition, our China Vice-Presidency is busy preparing its triennium plans and has recently conducted a survey of the membership in order to obtain feedback and suggestions towards the development of the strategic plan for the next three years.

Last but not least, we would like to encourage your comments and feedback. Your thoughts and opinions are very important to us, as it is our utmost priority to ensure that our members are being heard. If you have suggestions related to the IGU magazine, please submit them to info@igu.org.

Thank you for your continued support and active engagement as we work to advance the natural gas industry and enhance IGU’s relevance.

Joo-Myung (Joe) Kang IGU President Luis Bertrán Rafecas IGU Secretary General

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