Right now, there is a tanker ship traveling west from British Columbia, Canada, toward South Korea. That tanker is carrying a first-of-its-kind payload: liquified natural gas, otherwise known as LNG, produced in Canada.

The global market for LNG has been booming, as countries in Asia and elsewhere try to wean themselves off of coal.

There are two ways to move natural gas long distance: “By pipeline, and then longer distances by ship,” said David Victor, a professor of climate policy at UC San Diego.

Canada has been exporting its gas the first way, by pipeline. And, because geography, it all goes to the U.S. Which wasn’t a huge issue, until President Donald Trump’s tariffs.

“Those were a wake-up call that Canada needs to diversify its exports,” said Victor.

Sending gas elsewhere, by ship, isn’t cheap, said Amy Myers Jaffe, an energy research professor at NYU.

“What you have to do is you have to take the gas, cryogenically lower its temperature to turn it into a liquid, and then you put it as a liquid on a ship, and then you sail it across, say, the Pacific Ocean,” said Jaffe.

Then, whoever buys that liquified gas, has to reverse the whole process. Gas companies in Canada invested around $30 billion in the infrastructure to do all this, said Adam Fremeth, at Ivey Business School in Ontario. The payoff?

“The premier of British Columbia, I think, estimates that it's going to add about a half percent to Canadian GDP,” said Fremeth.  “So a huge lift to the Canadian economy. Allowing us to get our natural gas products to new markets.”

Where they’ll be competing with another, major, LNG producer: the United States. 

“We’re the No. 1 in the world right now,” said Tom Seng, a professor of energy finance at Texas Christian University.

Seng said Canada’s LNG could have some advantages. It won’t have to transit the Panama Canal en route to Asia, like most U.S. gas.

“I see the United States as maintaining its No. 1 position for considerable period of time,” said Seng

Although Canada has more export terminals planned.