Joe Coletti
Welcome to Powering Sustainable Ideas, a podcast series from RBC Capital Markets, where we interview the leaders and companies powering the sustainable future. I'm your host for this episode, Joe Coletti. Today we're broadcasting from RBC’s Global Energy, Power and Infrastructure Conference in New York, and in this episode, we're joined by Joel Riddle, Chief Executive Officer of Tamboran Resources. Tamboran Resources is at the forefront of developing low CO2 unconventional gas resources in Australia's Northern Territory. The company's recent initiatives position it as a key player in supporting the energy transition in Australia, but also the Asia Pacific region. Joel, thanks for being with us today.
Joel Riddle
Great to be with you.
Joe Coletti
Joel, you've led Tamboran for over a decade now, building on global experience from Exxon Mobil to Cobalt. How has your leadership style evolved over this time, and how has that shaped Tamboran’s strategy in such a pivotal energy region?
Joel Riddle
Yeah, great question. As you mentioned, started out with a as a reservoir engineer for Exxon. I would say my initial roles at Exxon were very technical and commercial oriented, very outcome focused. One of the unique features have been in this job is it's about 10 times more complex. So, while a lot of CEOs here in the US are very much focused on the upstream, this is very much an integrated business plan. So we're clearly focused on the upstream and how we drill wells very efficiently. But we're also looking to build partnerships with midstream companies that will look to build bigger pipelines from the Beetaloo, but also looking to develop partnerships in the LNG side. So, Bechtel is a partner of ours, and that represents a lot of complexity to being able to achieve, kind of our two BCF business plan about 2030. So from a leadership perspective, I think, where upstream CEOs are kind of focused on just drilling efficient wells, this is a lot more complex, and it requires a leadership style that's less outcome focused and more really focused on winning the day. Everything around us is so complex, there's a lot of balls in the air, but I'd really just try to focus my team on just winning the day and just getting to do their job, head down, and just having the faith that if we do that every day over many years, then we will achieve our business plan, and that is to grow a business that is a EQT-style business in Asia Pacific, linked to Asia Pacific LNG.
Joe Coletti
Tamboran Resources has positioned itself as a key player in Australia's energy transition. How does that vision influence your current priorities, but also your investment decisions as well?
Joel Riddle
So first of all, there's new regulation in Australia that requires Tamboran and all the Beetaloo operators to be Net Zero Scope One upon commercial production. So this is a natural incentive for us to really be focused on how we operate in the Beetaloo with a very low carbon footprint. We are very blessed that the gas coming out of the ground in the Beetaloo is 3% CO2. So relative to other gas resources around the world, we're on the lower end on carbon. But one thing we're focused on is, how do we electrify a lot of our equipment? So for instance, we brought in a new fraction spread from Liberty Energy last year. It's a diesel spread, but we have an opportunity to convert that to electric. There's one of the largest renewable projects in the world called Sun Cable that's operating a large renewables project nearby, we can potentially pull electrons from that solar project to feed in to our operations.
There's a number of CCS projects that are nearby that we're going to be looking to integrate our gas streams, both as we think about a domestic supply going east. There's a large CCS project in Moomba, which is the Henry Hub equivalent in Australia. So it's a natural opportunity for us to drop off carbon into that CCS project. And then, as we think about LNG out of Darwin, there's two CCS projects being developed today that we will look to integrate our LNG strategy into. So a core function of our strategy is to make sure that when we develop, we're developing again in a low carbon way, and then at the last resort, we'll buy carbon offsets to ensure that we will be net zero.
And I think that puts us at a really competitive advantage relative to other big gas projects around the world, where I think a lot of gas companies talk about Net Zero, probably less so today than they did three years ago, but we are absolutely committed to it. And I think that'll, not only is that good for the environment, but I believe that's going to allow us to attract deeper pools of capital to develop large scale resource like we're doing in the Beetaloo.
Joe Coletti
So you mentioned the Beetaloo Basin. Can you maybe elaborate a little bit more on just the significance of that region, but also your plans for its development?
Joel Riddle
Yeah, so enormous resource. It's 5 million gross acres. You can comfortably fit the Permian Basin within the outline of the Beetalo. The drilling that we've seen to date, the rock properties from the wells are very similar to the Marcellus shell. So high quality, world class shell that we're looking to develop. Our goal is to develop the first two BCF a day by 2030, a BCF a day that we're going to direct to the domestic market on the east coast of Australia. This is a structural short market. It trades at around three to four times Henry Hub. So it's a very much a premium gas market that we're looking to develop the first BCF a day out of the basin two. And really our strategy in the early stage is to ensure that the domestic market in Australia is well supplied, so there's energy security for Australians, and then once we have that one BCF a day online, we will direct further development toward LNG. We want to do initial one BCF a day to connect to a 6 million ton LNG train by 2030 and then we have the potential to develop three more trains on that same site. So in total, we would hope to have those four trains online during the 2030s. So between now and 2030 it's all about the domestic market, how to get initial volumes to make sure that we have energy security in Australia. And then 2030 and beyond will be all about LNG.
Joe Coletti
So, I want to give you a chance to talk about the Shenandoah South pilot project, which marks a major milestone. What opportunity does it represent to the company, and what are the key developments or financial hurdles that you guys have to work through now?
Joel Riddle
Yeah, so the Shenandoah South pilot project will be underpinned by a 40 million a day contract that we've signed for 15 and a half years with the Northern Territory Government. First gas on this pilot project will be mid-2026 so roughly about 12 months from today, we'll be in first production. We just completed a $70 million capital raise that will put the company in a very strong position being, fully funded to execute this pilot project. And the wells that we are drilling today will be development wells. So up until now, the Beetaloo Basin has been in exploration phase, and so what we're doing is bringing the Beetaloo Basin from exploration phase into first production. And this is a big moment, not just for the company and our partners, but for the Beetaloo as a whole, for the Northern Territory as a whole. And there's 15 years of work that has gone into leading us to this big milestone.
As far as the relevance of the 40 million a day that we're bringing online. This is feeding into the Northern Territory gas market that currently trades at around 65 million cubic feet a day. The one field that has been supplying that market over the last 10 years is a field called Black Tip that is in terminal decline. So the 40 million a day that we're producing represents two thirds of the gas market in the Northern Territory. The territory is supplied 90% by this gas turbine. So in other words, the 40 million a day that we are producing by middle of next year is highly consequential to the Northern Territory and literally will keep the lights on in Darwin. In addition, this will be the first opportunity for royalties to flow to the traditional owners that cover the area in which we operate, initial royalties to flow to the Northern Territory Government, and it will create new jobs as well. So our focus in this initial phase is to ensure we have energy security, and we start to uplift economic prosperity in the area that we operate.
Joe Coletti
What kind of partnerships are proving most important to you as you move into sort of commercialization? How do you evaluate strategically, like, what's the right fit versus what may not be the right fit?
Joel Riddle
The focus we've been maintaining over the last couple of years is positioning the company to really achieve a very strong cost reduction in the drilling and completing of wells. That's been a real issue with operators today, where they've brought in undersized rigs. Frack spreads in Australia, up until now, had been very limited in horsepower, limited in capability of performing a US style fracture stimulation. So what we've been focused on is bringing in high quality partners from the US in the last two years. First partnership was with Helmerich & Payne to bring in a modern flex three rig. This is a 2200 horsepower, million pound hook load rig, so one of their bigger rigs, and we have access to five of them. So this is the biggest rig that's operating in Australia today, and it's the first rig that's been imported into the country in 20 years, believe it or not.
Getting the right drilling rig into the country was priority one. Priority two was getting a modern frack spread into the country. So, we formed a partnership at Liberty Energy in 2023, brought in a refurbished frack spread from Liberty, and both the rig and the FRAC equipment that H&P and Liberty have brought in came with crews from the US as well. So it's very important to me to get the right equipment, but also have the same crews that have been drilling and completing wells in the Marcellus, in the Permian and other big shell plays in the US and import that technology into the well pad in the Beetaloo so that we can get down the cost curve and replicate the performance that all the US shell players have developed in the last 15 years as part of the shell revolution. We're in advanced discussions with a few oil field services providers. Both of these partnerships would very much be focused on the ways that we can, over time, get our costs down and drive performance.
The last thing as a unique feature of both the H&P and Liberty deals is that they are also our fourth and fifth largest shareholder. So they not only have provided equipment, but they are also aligned on the equity of Tamboran, and getting those guys early on and in the bunker with Tamboran around positioning the company to accelerate a large development is absolutely key to our success.
Joe Coletti
Can you talk about what emerging technologies Tamboran is exploring to enhance its gas extraction but also your overall sustainability performance?
Joel Riddle
Yeah, it's good question. Something we maintain a lot of focus on. I think first, we're drilling two miler horizontals today, and these rigs have the capability of drilling up to four miles or more. So I think one of the things that we're going to be on the front end of as we move forward toward two BCF a day is how to get longer laterals being drilled in the coming years ahead. That will involve looking at synthetic muds, and something the drilling and HMP teams are really focused on at the moment, is once we get our pilot wells on.
I think second is the opportunities to integrate zipper fracking into our completion operations. So right now the last well that we pump 35 stages on, we were pumping five stages a day. With zipper fracking, we can do 10-12, stages a day, kind of equivalent to what all the operators in the Marcellus are doing. And that's something we'll have the opportunity to see those efficiencies in the upcoming pilot wells.
And then on the technology front, I think it's worthwhile noting that one of the strategies the company has is how we can hook up our gas to data centers. So when you think about where the Beetaloo is well positioned as abundant resource. We have abundant land, we have abundant water, and, I can see a world where we can put on five gigawatts of data centers in the next 10 years. So obviously, having a lot of conversations with hyperscalers around that strategy, but that's something we see like it's just a no brainer for the Beetalo to be big into data centers in the future.
Joe Coletti
Can you talk about some of the key regulatory dynamics in the Northern Territory and how they're kind of shaping your timelines, but also how your continued approach with stakeholder engagement?
Joel Riddle
We're very blessed to have a very development focused territory government that just came into power less than a year ago. And they came out right after they were elected, and started putting into the regulations ways to streamline approvals. So one of the things I was very excited about was the appointment of a territory coordinator. So that role has the ability to really streamline approvals on production, on pipelines, and really be laser focused on how do we develop quickly and efficiently.
They've recently announced a pipeline corridor that would connect the Beetaloo to Darwin, and that corridor has the potential to fit 3x 42 inch pipelines into.
The NT government is forward thinking around how to ensure that we have a regulatory regime to accelerate new pipelines. One of the biggest keys to unlocking large scale gas development out of the Beetaloo is streamlining pipeline approval. And so not only are they talking about one pipeline, but multiple pipelines, and that's just music to my ears, because as we start thinking about scaling up, 24 mtpa and integrated LNG development, you have to think about midstream, you have to think about regulatory and how to thread the needle to ensure you have this certainty, and that will feed into capital flowing into your development. One thing I've learned 12 years and been in my job is that capital is very mobile. It will flow to where you have, obviously, great resources and great upside, but also something I've been really working toward in a lot of the dialog I've had with government in the last few years is, look, we have a big business plan, but in order to attract the capital, we have to have certainty around regulations.
Joe Coletti
I want to have you look ahead as we close our conversation here. You know you mentioned a lot of the strategic priorities throughout the conversation, but, as you're talking to investors, when you think about the next 5, 10, 15 plus years, what are you focusing on? What are you trying to get them to focus on and think about when it comes to Tamboran. And how do you see Tamboran’s role evolving in the Australian, Asia Pacific area energy landscape?
Joel Riddle
First, it's all about attracting the right strategic partners to that we can work with, long term. We will likely announce a partner on OFS in the next months ahead. And then, there's opportunities to work with midstream companies that are interested in Australia. So I think probably in the next couple of years, getting the team set is my goal, is making sure I have the right partnerships in place to be able to scale. And that is pipeline, that's, kind of gathering and compression. But it also is partnership in LNG with Bechtel. That strategic partnership that we have with Bechtel, I think, gives us a real advantage to being able to scale to 24 mtpa out of Darwin by in the 2030s.
As I think about the next 10 or 15 years, what we're looking for is to partner with a high quality IOC. We're running a farm out process right now that will tie an IOC partnership to our phase two development, which will direct BCF a day to the east coast. But then there is a further partnership that we see around LNG. So part of this is a finding the right fit for us. We see ourself being kind of the kind of the XTO equivalent to Exxon, to a major a company that has very strong relationships in the field, with the communities, with the government, has really cracked the nut on the IP of how to develop in the Beetaloo. And, again, well positioned to be kind of the next XTO in Asia Pacific.
Joe Coletti
I think that's a great place to end. I enjoyed having you on the podcast.
Joel Riddle
It's great to be with you. Thank you very much.
Joe Coletti
That's it for our conversation today. Thanks again for listening to Powering Sustainable Ideas, brought to you by RBC Capital Markets. This episode was recorded on June 4, 2025. Please remember to subscribe to get more great content and be alerted about future episodes. See you all next time.
Disclaimer
This content is based on information available at the time it was recorded and is for informational purposes only. It is not an offer to buy or sell or a solicitation, and no recommendations are implied. It is outside the scope of this communication to consider whether it is suitable for you and your financial objectives.