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[sarkasm] 01/5/2018 11:41

BP's European natural gas price realization jumps to near three-year high

London (Platts)--1 May 2018 626 am EDT/1026 GMT

BP said Tuesday its average realized gas price in Europe jumped to $7.18/Mcf ($7.01/MMBtu) in the first quarter of 2018 -- a near three-year high -- as wholesale prices rallied due to periods of extreme cold weather.

* Highest sales price since Q2 2015 as wholesale prices rise

* European gas realization up 29% on quarter, 33% on year

* BP still suffering from low US realized gas prices

The realized price was up 29% on the previous quarter and 33% year on year, reaching the highest level since the second quarter of 2015.

BP's global realized gas price was also higher at $3.78/Mcf, buoyed by higher sales prices in its rest of the world segment, and despite a slight dip in its US sales price to $2.25/Mcf, the lowest since Q3 2016.

European majors saw a steady improvement in realized gas prices in 2017 as wholesale prices recovered from multi-year lows over the course of 2016.

European gas prices slumped in 2016 and for part of 2017 due to an oversupplied market and relatively mild weather across Europe.

BP's realized European price fell to a multi-year low in Q3 2016 of just $3.94/Mcf -- the equivalent of $3.83/MMBtu.

European gas prices recovered toward the end of 2017 and early 2018 due to market tightness and higher demand.

The average day-ahead price at the UK NBP hub in Q1 was $8.06/MMBtu, according to S&P Global Platts assessments, while the average day-ahead price at the Dutch TTF was slightly lower at $7.69/MMBtu.

US GAS OUTPUT

BP was hit particularly hard by the continued low Henry Hub gas price in the US in the wake of the shale gas boom.

BP has said it could drive forward its US gas business at a sub-$3/MMBtu Henry Hub price, having brought down its operating costs to below the peer average.

BP is more exposed to US gas prices than its European peers given its large portfolio of producing assets in the US.

CFO Brian Gilvary, speaking on a conference call with analysts Tuesday, said BP's portfolio in the US lower 48 was "very gassy" with 85% of its production gas and the remaining 15% liquids.

BP's US gas production in Q1 averaged 1.79 Bcf/d, compared with just 217 MMcf/d in Europe.

The company's total gas output in the period was 7.46 Bcf/d, with the rest of the world accounting for the balance.

Its worldwide gas business is growing quickly with new projects having started up in Oman and Egypt.

Its huge Shah Deniz 2 gas field project in Azerbaijan is also due to begin producing gas in the coming months, Gilvary said.

"Shah Deniz 2 is an incredibly strategic and important project for Europe. It is 99% complete," he said.

--Stuart Elliott, [e-mail]

--Edited by Alisdair Bowles, [e-mail]

[the grumpy old men] 20/4/2018 11:02

German government confirms plan to add LNG infrastructure

London (Platts)--20 Apr 2018 542 am EDT/942 GMT

Germany's new government plans to add LNG infrastructure with the planned import terminal at Brunsbuttel the most likely project as the cleaner fuel will become key to reducing shipping emissions, the economy and energy ministry said in a statement.

Germany's new maritime policy coordinator Norbert Brackmann and the state minister for Schleswig-Holstein Daniel Guenther will visit the GATE LNG terminal in Rotterdam Thursday, it said.

GATE project partners Gasunie and Vopak also plan to develop a 5 Bcm/year LNG import facility at Brunsbuttel in the state of Schleswig-Holstein.

According to the ministry's statement, the visit is the first step for the next concrete measures for the realization of the project.

"We want to make Germany a location for LNG infrastructure," the statement said, adding that LNG will play a central role on the way to a'greenshipping'.

Last week, a key committee of the International Maritime Organization (IMO) agreed a strategy to cut the shipping industry's total greenhouse gas emissions by 50% from 2008 levels by 2050.

OPEN SEASON

The German LNG Terminal project partners are currently sounding out market interest in a so-called'open season' until the end of April and plan to take an investment decision on the project in 2019, depending on the results of the open season.

The start of operations would be envisaged by end-2022, when Germany also plans to exit nuclear power generation.

The ministry's statement added that once there is an established business case by the project developers, talks about the realization will start.

Plans to add LNG infrastructure in Germany were a surprise inclusion in the coalition treaty in February.

The Brunsbuttel project is also included in the federal gas grid development plan, which secures a link to the national grid.

Germany is the EU's biggest gas market, but previous plans to build an LNG import terminal fell by the wayside due to uncertainty over future gas demand and the high cost of building a permanent LNG terminal.

The Eur400 million ($500 million) facility would give the country an alternative gas supply to pipeline imports from Russia and Norway.

--Andreas Franke, [e-mail]

[waldron] 17/4/2018 11:44

Northern Territory fracking moratorium to be lifted, Australian LNG exporters prepped to move in

Singapore (Platts)--17 Apr 2018 632 am EDT/1032 GMT

Australia's Northern Territory government announced Tuesday it will lift its near two-year moratorium on hydraulic fracturing in the region, which could pave the way for natural gas producers to unlock resources and supply gas to LNG export projects.

The announcement was welcomed by Australia's gas industry, including LNG exporters Origin Energy and Santos, which both have assets in Australia's Top End region.

"Following the very thorough and detailed independent scientific inquiry, we are pleased that a sensible and fact-based decision has been made that will allow appropriately regulated activity to resume," Origin executive general manager for integrated gas Mark Schubert said.

Origin, the upstream operator of Australia Pacific LNG, last year banked on the moratorium being lifted by increasing its interest in the region's Beetaloo Joint Venture through an acquisition of Sasol Petroleum's 35% stake which took Origin's share to 70%.

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"Well testing completed just prior to the moratorium indicated there was a very promising, material gas resource in the Beetaloo sub-basin," Schubert said.

"We now plan to resume work as soon as practical, adopting the recommendations of the scientific inquiry and gaining the necessary approvals to complete our remaining exploration and appraisal commitments," he said.

Likewise, Santos, which leads the Gladstone LNG project, praised the decision and is champing at the bit to get to work on its NT assets.

"With exploration and appraisal success, the NT's McArthur Basin has the potential to do for the NT and Australia what the shale gas revolution has done for America, providing the competitive advantage to breathe life back into the energy-intensive industries and generate wealth for the nation," Santos CEO and managing director Kevin Gallagher said.

"There is a window of opportunity to also grow LNG exports as global supply gaps open up in the early to mid-2020s," he said.

He said Santos will be ready to go in the 2019 dry season, which runs from May until October.

The Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association also welcomed the decision but warned that the manner and timeframe in which the government implements the 135 recommendations by the inquiry will be critical in determining its commercial viability - noting that 30 of them must be brought in to effect before exploration activity can resume.

"If they are to be implemented, they must be addressed within the next six months to ensure the industry can be on the ground exploring in the 2019 dry season," APPEA's NT director Matthew Doman said.

RBC Capital Markets analyst Ben Wilson said the potential for the region is large and echoed Gallagher's comments that it could be comparable to the US.

"[Beetaloo] a multi-Tcf onshore play driven by a quality depositional setting and reservoir characteristics on par with US gas plays including the Marcellus and Barnett shales. As shown by the initial booking of gross 6.6 Tcf of 2C resource by Origin and a preliminary assessment of the Lower Kyalla from Origin, the Beetaloo is not just one play but a series of stacked plays which increases the appeal further," he said.

It also has the added advantage of being broadly connected to two export routes, which include Darwin LNG and will include Gladstone once the Northern Gas Pipeline is constructed - which is expected in December.

--Abache Abreu, [e-mail]
--Nathan Richardson, [e-mail]
--Edited by Alisdair Bowles, [e-mail]

[florenceorbis] 13/4/2018 20:37

What Propelled US Liquefied Natural Gas Boom to Second-Largest Exporter by 2022?
Patrick Tyrrell
By Patrick Tyrrell | April 13, 2018 | 3:09 PM EDT
Liquid natural gas facility (Screenshot)

When Americans think of U.S. exports, many think of cars, technology, or agricultural products. Most, though, never pay a second thought to U.S. exports of liquefied natural gas.

In the past two years, the United States has not only become an exporter of liquefied natural gas, it is predicted to become the second-largest exporter of the fuel by 2022.

The last time the United States exported more natural gas than it imported was in 1957, when Dwight D. Eisenhower was president.

For decades, the United States was on the outside looking in when it came to the international natural gas industry. If anything, it was predicted that the U.S. was going to become increasingly dependent on natural gas imports.

The reason for the sudden turnaround is because of the innovation of directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing, otherwise known as fracking, combined with a new capability to transport highly cooled natural gas from the U.S. in liquefied form in large ships known as LNG carriers.
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That has allowed previously inaccessible pockets of natural gas in the U.S. to be made available to consumers at home and all over the world.

In 2016, the export of U.S. liquefied natural gas was about 0.5 billion cubic feet per day. That number nearly quadrupled in 2017 to 1.94 billion cubic feet per day. By the end of 2019, it is predicted that the United States will have the capacity to export more than 9 billion cubic feet per day.



Natural gas is liquefied at extremely low temperatures at the Louisiana Sabine Pass liquefaction terminal, which opened in 2016, and also at the Dominion Energy LNG terminal at Cove Point, Maryland, which sent out its first shipment this year. There is a third export terminal in Kenai, Alaska, and several others are planned or currently under construction.

To date, the largest consumers of liquefied natural gas from the U.S. have been Mexico, South Korea, and China, which combined account for 53 percent of U.S. exports in 2017.

One new trading partner worth noting is Lithuania. Looking to cut its dependence on Russian energy sources, Lithuania became an importer of U.S. liquefied natural gas in 2017. This highly symbolic but also politically desirable and commercially viable gesture signifies the arrival of the U.S. liquefied natural gas industry on the world scene as a competitive force impossible to ignore.
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So, the next time you think about exports from the United States, think about the U.S. liquefied natural gas industry, and its great potential for the future.

Caleb Pascoe is a member of the Young Leaders Program at The Heritage Foundation.

Patrick Tyrrell is a research coordinator in The Heritage Foundation’s Center for International Trade and Economics.

Editor's Note: This piece was originally published by The Daily Signal.

[florenceorbis] 13/4/2018 13:50

Tankers: Shell signs time-charter deal with AET for two LNG dual-fueled Aframaxes

Singapore (Platts)--13 Apr 2018 743 am EDT/1143 GMT

Malaysian tanker operator AET Tankers and Shell have formalized arrangements for the long-term charter of AET's two newbuild LNG dual-fueled Aframax tankers commencing in Q4 2018.

"These two LNG fueled vessels will help Shell Trading move crude, principally in the Atlantic basin. LNG is a credible marine fuel and will play an important role in our fleet as we introduce cleaner and more efficient vessels. As emissions standards tighten we continue to work with forward thinking companies like AET to support lower emission transportation solutions," said Mark Quartermain, vice president of crude trading and supply at Shell, in a statement released by AET Thursday.

AET's two 113,000 dwt vessels are currently being built by Samsung Heavy Industries in South Korea and are due for delivery from Q3 2018.

When operating in gas mode, these LNG dual-fueled tankers would emit up to 30% less CO2, 85% less NOx, 99% less SOx and 95% less particulates.

Both tankers will be Malaysian-flagged.

In early April, AET announced it would equip up to four Aframax newbuilds with the LNG dual-fuel option. AET's orderbook also includes two Suezmaxes and two Long Range 2 tankers.

In the light of coming regulatory changes on bunker fuel, LNG is considered to be a viable alternative to heavy fuel oil. From 2020, all shipping will be required to use fuel with a maximum of 0.5% sulfur.

In June 2017, AET was awarded a contract to build and operate two LNG dual-fueled DP2 Offshore Loading Shuttle Tankers for service in oilfields on the Norwegian Continental Shelf of the North Sea, Norwegian Sea and the southern Barents Sea as well as on the UK Continental Shelf. When operational, these ships are expected to be among the world's first LNG-fueled DP shuttle tankers and the most energy efficient.

AET specializes in the global ocean transport of petroleum and owns a fleet comprising 14 VLCCs, six Suezmaxes, one Panamax, 43 Aframaxes, four DP shuttle tankers, 13 chemical carriers, five LR2s, three MR2s and one LPG tanker.

AET is the petroleum logistics unit of Malaysian energy logistics group MISC Berhad. MISC is a subsidiary of Malaysian energy conglomerate Petronas.

--Wanda Wang, [e-mail]

--Edited by Alisdair Bowles, [e-mail]

[ariane] 12/4/2018 18:33

(Update: comments from GTT's CFO)


PARIS (Agefi-Dow Jones) - The manufacturer of cryogenic membranes used to transport liquefied natural gas Gaztransport & Technigaz (GTT.FR) confirmed on Thursday its objectives for 2018, after having seen its turnover grow by 12, 4% in the first quarter, helped in particular by the sharp increase in LNG tankers' fees.


GTT's revenues, whose technologies equip the majority of LNG carriers worldwide, amounted to 64.17 million euros, compared with 57.09 million euros for the corresponding period. of 2017, and is "online" with the expectations of the group.


"The first quarter of 2018 was marked by a strong increase in orders: we are already registering 10 orders for LNG tankers, one FSRU (floating storage and regasification unit for liquefied natural gas), as well as the equipment of a bunker ship" commented Philippe Berterottière, CEO of GTT, in a statement.


"This pace of orders is a strong signal of the good performance of the LNG market," he continued.


Revenue from royalties amounted to 61.53 million euros, an increase of 14.9%, driven by a sharp increase in revenue from the LNG tankers' fees, to 54.57 million euros, an increase of 19.5%.


Service revenue was € 2.64 million, down 25%.


The service activity had a slow start to the year, said a conference call Marc Haestier, the chief financial officer of GTT, highlighting the decline in the study services and approvals of suppliers and a limited impact of the integration of Ascenz, acquired at the end of 2017.


But the first quarter "is not representative" of the activity planned for the whole year for services, assured Marc Haestier.


GTT has confirmed that the entire financial year will be based on a turnover of between 235 and 250 million euros and an EBITDA of 145 to 155 million euros. The Group also plans to distribute a dividend for the 2018 financial year at least equivalent to that paid for the 2015, 2016 and 2017 fiscal years, ie € 2.66 per share.


For the 2019 financial year, the group is aiming for a minimum dividend distribution rate of 80% of the distributable net income.


-Alice Doré, Agefi-Dow Jones; [phone]; [e-mail]; ed: ECH


Agefi-Dow Jones The financial newswire


(END) Dow Jones Newswires


April 12, 2018 13:00 ET (17:00 GMT)

[sarkasm] 12/4/2018 14:56

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Thursday 12 April 2018
Interview: Energy boss turning up the heat on traditional fuels as bio era arrives
Interview: Gino Vansteenhuyse, Calor CEO
Vansteenhuyse graduated from the Solvay Business School in Brussels with a Masters of Economics
1
Vansteenhuyse graduated from the Solvay Business School in Brussels with a Masters of Economics
Ellie Donnelly

Ellie Donnelly

April 12 2018 2:30 AM




Gino Vansteenhuyse has been chosen as the man to lead Calor Gas in Ireland as it begins a new era for the business in the renewable energy sector with the launch of bio liquefied petroleum gas (BioLPG).

Prior to his January appointment here, Vansteenhuyse was chief commercial officer at Primagaz in France, which is also part of the family-owned SHV Group that owns Calor.

He was country manager for Primagaz in his native Belgium before that.

He thinks the scale of the international business gives Calor the heft and expertise it needs to compete in a tough sector.

SHV, he points out, is the largest dedicated global LPG distributor on the market, operating in 27 countries and supplying LPG to over 30 million customers.

In an organisation of that size big people learn a lot from each other, he says.

"We have a lot of meetings with functional peers and so on, this is a major benefit, it is important to be able to have meetings with the person that does the same thing as you in Germany or in Belgium or wherever and then you identify early best-in-practice methods."

The other big benefit is access to new products, including the BioLPG being launched here, a gas fuel created from waste and vegetable oils capable of running heating and transport systems, he says.

"The second benefit to being part of a larger group is your capacity to do innovation, and I relate it to BioLPG, we would never have been able as a traditional Irish-based big brand with 50,000 customers, to do the research into BioLPG and guarantee the long-term future.

"It is also an important possibility for young people with ambition to be able to go and work abroad within the company," Vansteenhuyse says.

"You can gain a lot of experience and insights into how people in other countries do or handle the same business that you have at home. I think this is a good way of investing in your people, your business, and so investing in your customers.

"Also, in this family-owned business, the values of people, respect, and longevity are very key."

That said, Calor has different challenges to its sister companies elsewhere in Europe. Vansteenhuyse says he was aware of this "interesting" market.

"Ireland is an island, which is different from mainland Europe in the whole energy reflection, security of supply and so on.

"A country that's about 50pc rural is a nice market to work in because you can promote your energy and your solutions deeper and in a larger scale than in Holland where 98pc is natural gas, or even other countries where it is 80 or 70pc".

That said, Vansteenhuyse admits having a "very rural" market requires Calor to have a big fleet on the ground to deliver to all the regions.

"Access-wise it is a challenge for a company such as Calor, to go the extra mile - and I am very impressed by the way Calor is doing this."

On a slightly negative note, Vansteenhuyse notes that the energy environment has "maybe got a little less interest in Ireland than I saw on mainland Europe, in terms of energetic transition, especially on energy efficiency".

That's costing customers, he says.

"The quality of insulation of houses is way lower in Ireland than in mainland Europe and this is an important thing ... there is a big need to get houses and buildings upgraded, whereas this has happened over the last 15-20 years on mainland Europe.

"What this means for the end consumer [in Ireland] is that a bigger chunk of their income is going to energy instead of to other things."

As a newcomer to the country Vansteenhuyse is proud to have discovered that Calor is "a fantastically well-known brand".

"In the time I have been here, I hear the brand come up when with other people, whether it is the butcher or the hairdresser, or dentist, if I say Calor, they all know the brand, they can all say "Oh, that is an Irish brand that has helped the way Irish homes are equipped and how people live."

"It is nice to hear that the brand is so well-respected and so well known.

"There are a lot of similarities in how you serve customer needs, but when I look for the differences, I think that in Ireland, the customers that are using our product LPG as a home heating solution get extremely well serviced by Calor.

"Three-quarters of the customers have a gas tank in their garden - similar to an oil tank - and we know centrally precisely what is in the tank, so that makes a big difference in terms of the service. It is always there, customers don't have to worry, and that is a big difference between most countries and Ireland. Ireland already made the step over the last 10-15 years of bringing that extra service to our customers."

The conversation turns inevitably to Brexit - Calor operates across the island of Ireland - something that may well pose a future challenge to the new CEO.

"We watch it but we are not majorly concerned, as we are already operating with a North of Ireland company and Republic of Ireland company, we fill our cylinders in the North and we fill them in the south."

However, he acknowledges that were a hard Brexit to happen, Calor will lose some optimisation in how it moves its trucks around the country, something that he says will lead to higher costs and "non-efficiencies".

Vansteenhuyse also notes that some of Calor's customers would be negatively impacted from a hard Brexit.

"We see that the dairy industry, the hotel sector, could be a bit hurt, farming is the big one, Calor would have a big market among dairy, poultry, and grain farming, so Brexit might affect some of our customers."

Perhaps surprisingly, Vansteenhuyse doesn't see the fact that almost 40pc of gas comes into Europe from Russia as being a "major issue".

"There are loads of floating and fixed LNG terminals. Security of supply around Europe with the interconnection was a big goal. America is now a net exporting country in oil and in natural gas, and ships can go easily from America to all the LNG terminals assuring supply for the long-term.

"Today supply is greater than demand, so the dependency on Russia is becoming smaller and smaller.

"We see also that the LPG supplies for us have gone up, which is good news for us and for our customers. What that means is that long-term there will be less price volatility on the market.

"The fact that the US has turned into an export country has brought some more stability."

Looking to the future, Vansteenhuyse says Calor is not on the lookout for acquisitions.

"We are focusing on growing our traditional business on traditional LPG and we are growing our customer base each year, so we are successful in convincing people to join us and leave oil.

"This will definitely continue in the future, because most governments in Europe have seen that oil is not the sustainable future for tomorrow, so we have a big role to play there."

However, he does see opportunities in Ireland, including liquefied natural gas. "Why? It is a totally different product, we are going to look at this in respect of the transport industry, because Europe is looking at changing heavy lorries from diesel-driven to LNG-driven, France and Germany are leading on this, and Italy, this is not an acquisition, it is a diversification, but close to our core business.

"Doing those three things is a lot of work, and a lot of energy, so we are not looking for acquisitions in Ireland.

"We are further acquiring at group level, entering new markets. We just acquired a company the size of the Calor Ireland business in North America, where we want to grow as a group.

"But in Ireland it is going to be organic growth, innovation and new products and innovating in value-adding products in order to grow our own business."

[sarkasm] 12/4/2018 14:39

12/04/2018 | 2:19 p.m.

The European Commission has approved under the European Merger Regulation the acquisition by Total of a portfolio of liquefied natural gas (LNG) assets owned by Engie, both based in France. Engie's portfolio of LNG assets subject to the concentration includes LNG supply, sale and regasification contracts, liquefaction and liquefaction plant ownership and drawing rights, as well as legal entities and staff associated with these activities.

The Commission concluded that the proposed acquisition would not give rise to competition concerns in light of the limited overlap between Total's and Engie LNG's activities in the wholesale supply, transportation and regasification of LNG, than the liquefaction of natural gas.

In addition, the vertical relationships between Total and Engie LNG are not likely to weaken competition in the wholesale supply and regasification of LNG in the European Economic Area and in France in particular.

[sarkasm] 10/4/2018 11:27

Team discloses the formation of burning ice in oceanic clay rich sediment
April 10, 2018, The Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST)
KAIST Discloses the formation of burning ice in oceanic clay rich sediment
A formation of gas hydrates with water molecules. Credit: KAIST

A KAIST research team has identified the formation of natural gas hydrates, so-called flammable ice, formed in oceans. Professor Tae-Hyuk Kwon from the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering and his team found that clay minerals in oceanic clay-rich sedimentary deposits promote formation of gas hydrates and proposed the principle of gas hydrate formation in the clayey sedimentary layers.

Gas hydrates are ice-like crystalline structures composed of hydrogen-bonded water molecules encapsulating gas molecules. They are also known as burning ice. Deposits are so huge that researchers are exploring them as an alternative energy source. Conventionally, it was believed that formation of gas hydrates is limited in clay sedimentary deposits; however, the unexpected abundance of natural gas hydrates in oceanic clay-rich sedimentary deposits raised the issue of how they formed.

The surfaces of natural clay minerals are negatively charged, and thus unavoidably generate physicochemical interactions between clay and water. Such clay-water interactions have a critical role in the occurrence of natural gas hydrates in clay-rich sedimentary formations.

However, researchers encountered difficulty in analyzing hydrate formation because of the cations contained in clay particles, which balance the clay surface charges. Therefore, clay particles inevitably release the cations when mixed with water, which complicates the interpretation of experimental results.
KAIST Discloses the formation of burning ice in oceanic clay rich sediment
An enhancement and inhibition of gas hydrates. Credit: KAIST

To overcome this limitation, the team polarized water molecules with an electric field and monitored the induction times of water molecules forming gas hydrates. They found that the 10 kV/m of electric field promoted gas hydrate nucleation under certain conditions rather than slowing it down, due to the partial breakage of the hydrogen-bonded water clusters and the lowered thermal energy of water molecules.

Professor Kwon said, "Through this research, we gained better insight into the origin of gas hydrates occurrence in clay-rich sedimentary deposits. In the near future, we will soon be able to commercially produce methane gas from natural gas hydrate deposits."

This research, led by PhD candidate Taehyung Park, was published online in Environmental Science and Technology on February 3.

Explore further: Advanced knowledge and new technologies in gas hydrate research

More information: Taehyung Park et al, Effect of Electric Field on Gas Hydrate Nucleation Kinetics: Evidence for the Enhanced Kinetics of Hydrate Nucleation by Negatively Charged Clay Surfaces, Environmental Science & Technology (2018). DOI: 10.1021/acs.est.7b05477


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[waldron] 09/4/2018 14:46

ABB has been selected as the Automation and Electrical partner for NextDecade’s Rio Grande LNG project
Equipment for 27 mtpa LNG export facility to be located on the Brownsville Ship Channel in South Texas
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ABB has been selected as the Automation and Electrical partner for NextDecade’s Rio Grande LNG project
ABB has been selected as the Automation and Electrical partner for NextDecade’s Rio Grande LNG project

NextDecade Corporation has chosen ABB Ltd. to provide an integrated automation and electrical solution for its Rio Grande LNG project in South Texas. The automation of plant control systems will optimize plant performance and efficiency, representing a logical extension of NextDecade’s low cost, lower risk development strategy in combination with Rio Grande LNG’s optimal South Texas location. “This agreement enables NextDecade to drive higher capital efficiencies through a unique, integrated approach among ABB, CB&I – NextDecade’s EPC contractor – and the NextDecade team via automation and electrical systems,” said Matt Schatzman, NextDecade President & CEO. “NextDecade expects ABB’s solutions to reduce the schedule, equipment footprint, and cost of our Rio Grande LNG facility, while providing greater operational flexibility.”
Growing US market

“Partnering with ABB not only provides a fully integrated automation and electrical solution, but also ABB Ability™, our integrated digital solutions offering. ABB Ability™ gives customers access to best-practice benchmarking, and transparency into operations, to improve operational performance, efficiency and productivity,” said Greg Scheu, ABB President Americas Region. “Our deep domain expertise, coupled with our history of innovation and collaboration with industry, will deliver a step change in operating efficiencies and improved throughput for NextDecade. Together, ABB, CB&I and NextDecade are helping to transform the growing LNG market in the U.S.”

ABB’s major projects execution center in Houston leads the industry in combined automation and electrical projects designed to deliver higher value for its customers globally. This world-class project delivery model will be fully deployed on the LNG project.

Rio Grande LNG is a proposed 27 mtpa LNG export facility to be located on a 984-acre site on the Brownsville Ship Channel in South Texas and will be constructed in phases timed to meet market demand. The approximately 137-mile proposed Rio Bravo Pipeline will supply the facility with its feedgas, connecting it to the Agua Dulce natural gas supply area. Rio Grande LNG is currently in the advanced stages of the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) review and permitting process.
Posted on March 26, 2018 - (11945 views)
by Kay Petermann

[maywillow] 08/4/2018 19:58

Germany Brushes Aside Trump Criticism Of Nord Stream 2
By Irina Slav - Apr 08, 2018, 12:00 PM CDT Germany

“Germany hooks up a pipeline into Russia, where Germany is going to be paying billions of dollars for energy into Russia. And I’m saying, ‘What’s going on with that?”’ President Trump said at a recent meeting with the leaders of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia at the White House. The remark certainly reflected the views of the Baltic leaders on Nord Stream 2, but what it did not reflect was Germany’s view on the matter, and Germany is the destination of the expanded pipeline.

Germany fully approved Nord Stream 2 at the end of March, and its regulator was confident that the approvals from the other four countries along the route of the pipeline will come soon. This week, Finland granted the first of two approvals for the project. Russia, Sweden, and Denmark remain. Germany will certainly do what needs to be done to convince Sweden and Denmark that Nord Stream 2 is a necessary piece of infrastructure and that whatever the political sentiment towards Russia in Europe, economies need fuel.

Germany itself is an example of this pragmatic approach: Angela Merkel slammed Moscow for its alleged involvement in the nerve gas attack against a former double spy and his daughter in the UK, but this did not prevent the government from standing behind Nord Stream 2 from the very beginning. On a side note, the Skripal narrative is beginning to unwind fast, and one senior German government official has already breached the right party line, questioning the lack of evidence in the case.

Nevertheless, the US President’s remarks are accurate: Germany will end up paying billions to Russia for gas. This is what happens when one country imports a lot of a commodity from another country. Still, Germany pays a lot less for Russian gas than other, smaller clients, such as Bulgaria. And as much as it might displease Trump, Russian gas is and will remain cheaper for Germany than U.S. LNG for a very simple reason called distance. Until U.S. producers find a way to make LNG production so cheap that the length of the journey to Europe allows it to remain competitive with Russian pipeline gas, the current state of affairs will persist.

Related: Oil Prices Poised To Rise As Cycle Comes To An End

Bloomberg reports how German lawmakers mocked President Trump’s comments on Nord Steam 2, saying that he was looking for ways to ensure markets for U.S. LNG, and felt that Nord Steam 2 interfered with these plans.

Of course, the United States will be looking for ways to sell its growing production of natural gas, just as Russia is seeking to strengthen its market share on a key market. But Germany is having none of Trump’s pressure, it seems. And, not to put too fine a point on it, but Germany is already planning to boost its LNG import capacity.

Europe’s largest economy is perfectly aware of the importance of energy source diversification. It is also perfectly aware that its energy needs will continue to grow as the economy grows and as it phases out all nuclear plants in the next few years. It cannot afford to rely entirely on Russia and Norway, so it is building LNG terminals. That should be good news for Washington. In reality, there is likely enough gas demand for both Russian and U.S. gas in Germany. There is also the geopolitical aspect of the Nord Stream saga, but history has shown that market forces usually trump politics and ideology.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com