By Lewis Jackson
SYDNEY (Reuters) -Chevron and unions representing workers at its two liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities in Australia made progress in talks over pay and conditions on Wednesday and would meet again on Thursday, a union representative said.
With workers threatening to resume strikes from next week at the facilities that supply around 6% of the world's LNG, Chevron (NYSE:CVX) and unions were holding negotiations before Australia's industrial arbitrator, the Fair Work Commission.
This is the second round of talks mediated by the commission in roughly as many weeks. Unions halted weeks of strikes at Chevron's sites in late September after an earlier round of talks produced a deal.
However, unions subsequently accused Chevron of reneging on certain commitments and said on Monday they would restart strikes on Oct. 19.
Chevron said on Monday the disagreements only concern a few issues, including reimbursement for travel and meals and it is committed to reaching a deal.
While Asian spot LNG prices LNG-AS on Friday retreated from 7-month highs on muted demand, the strike threat pushed up European gas prices NG/EU at the start of the week and have been further boosted by damage to a Finnish gas pipeline and as Middle East violence raised supply concerns.