Are you saying that Australia is extracting the gas in the North and West then shipping it to the South and East directly (using ships instead of laying pipes) or that they are exporting to whomever buys it and then importing from anyone selling it (buying foreign gas)?
There's a lot of joking/confusion around US oil being sold to foreign countries while buying foreign oil. However, a lot of that has to do with the fact the refineries are built to use heavy crude oil while the US oil is light/sweet crude so that they aren't really compatible. Sometimes, the export/import practices sound dumb on face value, but turn out to have some logic once the surface is scratched.
There's a lot of joking/confusion around US oil being sold to foreign countries while buying foreign oil. However, a lot of that has to do with the fact the refineries are built to use heavy crude oil while the US oil is light/sweet crude so that they aren't really compatible. Sometimes, the export/import practices sound dumb on face value, but turn out to have some logic once the surface is scratched.