In comments that may challenge the widely growing view that the Browse joint venture will not go ahead, with a final decision on Browse by a government-set deadline of June, Mr Coleman said demand for the gas remained strong and recent deferrals of expansions had seen costs stabilise. "We're very pleased with the information we have in front of us to make the decision," Mr Coleman told The Australian. The advantage we also have is we now see the market starting to roll over on the cost side -- we haven't seen decreases but we're seeing a flattening, which gives us a bit more confidence we're not chasing costs up. Woodside, the operator and 31 per cent owner of the project, has just given its joint-venture partners, who include Shell, BP, Mitsubishi, Mitsui and PetroChina, final cost and schedule estimates. When asked if the costs indicated an onshore project was viable, Mr Coleman said: "I never said it wasn't viable. I know some people are speculating on that, but Browse is a world-class resource; it's three billion barrels of oil equivalent; it's just offshore and it doesn't have all the CO2 some people would like you to think -- in fact, it's less than (Chevron's $52bn LNG project) Gorgon. Chevron's recent sale of its Browse stake to Shell, which has lifted its stake to 27 per cent, has spurred speculation, much to the chagrin of WA Premier Colin Barnett, that Shell's floating LNG technology was a more likely option to develop the project in a high-cost climate. It is believed the prospect of floating LNG has not been discussed by the Browse joint venture, whose retention lease conditions bind it to making a decision on processing the gas through a plant at James Price Point before looking at other options. "Browse doesn't need a technology breakthrough, this is a cost and execution challenge," Mr Coleman said. The challenge for the JV is to look at the cost and schedule we've just given them, they'll run through their own process and we'll meet back in a couple of months. Under previous retention lease conditions imposed by the WA and federal governments, the Browse joint venture had been ordered to evaluate James Price Point by mid-2012. The conditions, pushed back on a request by Mr Coleman, had been heavily influenced by former Woodside chief Don Voelte, who sought to stop joint venture partners Shell, Chevron and BHP Billiton pushing to delay development of the fields at the North West Shelf plant. "We're seeing the market flatten off, so the 12 months that we've taken on Browse to do the extra work to give us the assurance around cost and schedule has been very well spent," Mr Coleman said.