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[florenceorbis] 14/2/2019 10:23

GTT receives new LNG carrier order

Published by Will Owen, Editorial Assistant
LNG Industry, Thursday, 14 February 2019 10:00

GTT has received an order from Samsung Heavy Industries (SHI) regarding the tank design of a new 174 000 m3 LNG carrier, on behalf of the ship-owner Minerva Gas.

GTT's membrane containment system Mark III Flex + has been selected for the design of the tanks and the delivery of the ship is planned for 3Q21.

Philippe Berterottiere, Chairman and CEO of GTT declared: “We are very pleased that Minerva increases its presence in the world through this new market for Mark III Flex + technology. It demonstrates the attractiveness, for the LNG Industry players, of this containment system which offers the lowest level of Boil-Off Rate currently on the market.”

[florenceorbis] 07/2/2019 06:40

Natural Gas 07 Feb 2019 | 02:15 UTC Denver

Analysts expect largest draw of US natural gas from storage of season

Author Brandon Evans Jack Winters Editor Jennifer Pedrick Commodity Natural Gas

Denver — The EIA is expected to report on Thursday the largest natural gas draw from inventories of the season so far, but prices remained subdued across most of the US except for areas in the Pacific storage region where prices spiked on demand.
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The EIA is expected to report a 249 Bcf withdrawal for the week ended February 1, according to a survey of analysts by S&P Global Platts. Responses to the survey ranged for a draw of 238 Bcf to 260 Bcf.

A 249 Bcf draw would be the largest draw of the season and much more than the 116 Bcf withdrawal in the corresponding week last year and the five-year average pull of 150 Bcf. A withdrawal within expectations of 249 Bcf would decrease stocks to 1.948 Tcf. The deficit against the five-year average would expand to 427 Bcf and the deficit against last year would expand to 147 Bcf.

The draw looks to be stronger than the 173 Bcf draw reported last week. It shrunk inventories to 2.197 Tcf, which was 0.6% below the year-ago inventory of 2.211 Tcf, and 13% less than the five-year average of 2.525 Tcf.

The mild start to the year closed some of the historic deficit to the five-year average, but frigid weather in the Midwest has pushed recent withdrawals well above normal. Incremental gains in Texas and Southeast production were a drop in the bucket compared to the jump in heating demand for the week, according to S&P Global Platts Analytics.

However, NYMEX Henry Hub March futures remained low at $2.66/MMBtu Wednesday as demand has dropped precipitously for the week in progress. An early forecast for the week ending February 8 calls for a draw of only 70 Bcf, which would be 90 Bcf below the five-year average draw.

PACIFIC DRAWS While inventory in the East, Midwest and South Central regions have edged closer to the five-year average over the past month, EIA data shows the Pacific region standing more than 26% below the five-year average. Higher demand combined with curtailments have strengthened prices in the region.

Total demand in the region has spiked in recent days as cold fronts have blanketed both the Pacific Northwest and the Southwest. Although temperatures are forecast to bottom out Thursday, sustained below-normal temperatures are expected to remain for at least the next two weeks in both regions, likely causing above-average demand and providing little relief for already depressed storage levels. Sustained storage pulls over the next couple of weeks would drop inventory levels for the Southern California Gas Company and Pacific Gas & Electric well below previous years and make it difficult to refill to historical averages this coming summer. Beginning the injection season at such a deficit strengthens an already bullish picture for the West, especially California, this summer.

On Wednesday, SoCal Gas issued the first systemwide curtailment this winter for electric generation as demand has remained above 3.9 Bcf/d since Tuesday, the highest mark this winter and 200 MMcf/d above last winter's high. Preliminary prices for SoCal city-gate basis for Thursday's gas day settled at roughly $17.50/MMBtu above Henry Hub, an increase of over $16.50 from last Friday.

Total SoCal Gas inventories sit at 53.7 Bcf, 5 Bcf below last year despite beginning the winter 14 Bcf higher on the year. The recent stronger pulls have also lowered total PG&E inventories to 88.5 Bcf, 45 Bcf below last year.

The EIA plans to release its weekly storage report on Thursday at 10:30 am EST.

-- Brandon Evans, [e-mail]

-- Jack Winters, [e-mail]

-- Edited by Jennifer Pedrick, [e-mail]

[waldron] 06/2/2019 16:44

Oil And Gas In Spotlight At State Of The Union
By Irina Slav - Feb 06, 2019, 9:00 AM CST
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Trump SOTU

Record-breaking oil and gas production in the United States was one of the focal points of President Trump’s State of the Union Address this week, with an emphasis placed on the rollback of industry regulation that made this possible.

“We have unleashed a revolution in American energy -- the United States is now the number one producer of oil and natural gas in the world. And now, for the first time in 65 years, we are a net exporter of energy,” Trump said.

Energy analysts were quick to question the latter, if not the former, part of this statement, with data showing the U.S. only became a net exporter of energy for a short while last year, the overall ratio between production and consumption of hydrocarbons still makes the United States a net importer. Nevertheless, imports have fallen sharply in the last two years.

Local crude oil production is close to touching 12 million bpd. The latest weekly estimate from the Energy Information Administration has it at 11.9 million bpd. The agency last year forecast that if the pace of production increase continues, the United States could become a net energy exporter by 2020.

The United States has indeed increased its natural gas production, overtaking Iran and Russia to secure the title of the world’s largest producer of natural gas. Exports of that commodity are growing, too. A new report from Rystad Energy said, “With increasing export capacity, US LNG might be in a position to pose a serious challenge to Russian gas on the European market this year. Prices will come under pressure due to the healthy supply situation but the market is expected to tighten again after 2022, meaning that investment decisions for new liquefaction projects are needed this year in order to satiate future demand.”

The author of the report, Rystad’s head of gas market research, Carlos Torres Diaz, also said U.S. projects coming on stream will be the biggest contributors to global LNG production growth, which will hit 11 percent this year, to a total 350 million tons.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

[grupo] 05/2/2019 17:31

PARIS (Agefi-Dow Jones) - The manufacturer of cryogenic membranes for the transport of liquefied natural gas Gaztransport and Technigaz (GTT) announced Tuesday that it has received an order from Samsung Heavy Industries (SHI) for the design of LNG tanks. a new LNG carrier, with a capacity of 174,000 m3, on behalf of a European shipowner. Delivery of the vessel is expected in the first half of 2021. The GTT Mark III Flex membrane containment system was selected for the design of the tanks. "The name of the shipowner is at this stage confidential," said GTT in a statement. ([e-mail]) ed: LBO


Agefi-Dow Jones The financial newswire


(END) Dow Jones Newswires


February 05, 2019 12:07 ET (17:07 GMT)

[la forge] 31/1/2019 13:58

Natural Gas 31 Jan 2019 | 13:16 UTC London

Shell eyes higher Egypt LNG exports, mulls number of global LNG projects

Author Stuart Elliott Editor Alisdair Bowles Commodity Natural Gas Topic LNG Market Evolution

Highlights

Role in Qatar LNG expansion would make 'a lot of sense'

Continues work toward FIDs at Nigeria, Russia

LNG projects Shell LNG trading going from 'strength to strength': CFO

London — Shell hopes to increase LNG exports from its Idku plant in Egypt in 2019 having stepped up supplies in the latter part of last year, its head of integrated gas, Maarten Wetselaar, said Thursday.
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Speaking to reporters following the release of Shell's Q4 earnings, Wetselaar also said Shell sees potential to expand its LNG business through new project approvals and participation in the Qatari LNG expansion.

"We've seen an uptick in gas availability in Egypt recently so we've been exporting LNG and we expect to see that increase further in 2019," he said.

Egypt, he said, is now self-sufficient in gas, enabling Shell to resume more regular LNG exports having been restricted to just the occasional cargo over the past few years.

The rampup of the Eni-operated Zohr field has been instrumental in Egypt halting LNG imports and becoming a regular exporter again. Egypt's other LNG export plant, the Eni-operated Damietta facility, remains idled, however.

According to data from S&P Global Platts Analytics, Idku has exported 12 cargoes since October last year, having only shipped nine in 2018 up till then.
LIQUEFACTION, TRADING

Increased gas availability across Shell's LNG portfolio saw liquefaction volumes in Q4 rise by 3% year on year to 8.78 million mt, with its integrated gas business -- essentially its gas for LNG, LNG and gas-to-liquids business -- seeing earnings rise by 44% to $2.36 billion.

CFO Jessica Uhl said LNG trading had a good quarter and was going "from strength to strength."

"We had good positioning with our existing contracts so we were able to optimize, and we also took advantage of short-term opportunities," she said.

Wetselaar said benefiting from increased gas availability for its LNG plants was the "biggest value opportunity for the onstream part of our business."

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He cited extra feed gas serving the Gorgon plant in Australia, Oman LNG, Nigeria LNG and Atlantic LNG in Trinidad and Tobago in Q4.
QATAR EXPANSION, NEW TRAINS

Shell also remains active in looking at expanding existing projects and taking part in new ones.

In particular, Wetselaar said Shell wanted a stake in the planned four-train expansion in Qatar, taking the country's LNG production capacity from 77 million mt/year to 110 million mt/year.

"Qatar is scouting for investors -- clearly there is a lot more appetite than there is space," he said.

"It would make a lot of commercial sense for us to be part of that development and we will participate and hope to win," he said.

Other energy majors reportedly interested in a stake in the Qatar expansion include US companies ExxonMobil, Chevron and ConocoPhillips, France's Total, Norway's Equinor and Italy's Eni.

Elsewhere, Wetselaar said it was possible that the final investment decision on the seventh train at Nigeria LNG could be taken by the end of 2019.

"There is a lot of enthusiasm and it would make sense to expand the plant as Nigeria is not molecule-constrained," he said.

But, he said, "these FIDs are complex from a financial, regulatory and stakeholder perspective, and it takes time to line up all the strands before proposing FID."

Train 7 would boost Nigeria LNG production capacity by 8 million mt/year to 30 million mt/year.
RUSSIA, AUSTRALIA

Wetselaar also said talks continued on the proposed third train at Sakhalin LNG and the Baltic LNG plant in Russia.

On Sakahlin LNG, he said: "If we can secure [feed] gas on good terms we will build the third train, if not we'll spend our money elsewhere."

And for Baltic LNG -- the planned 10 million mt/year facility closer to Europe -- Wetselaar said work with partner Gazprom was ongoing to understand the "technical and commercial feasibility."

Finally, at its Prelude floating LNG project off Australia, CEO Ben van Beurden said four of seven upstream wells were now operational as part of project commissioning. "We are preparing for first LNG," van Beurden said.

Asked whether there were liquefaction issues at Prelude, Wetselaar said only that the company was focused on process safety. "We'll turn it on when it's ready to turn on," he said.

-- Stuart Elliott, [e-mail]

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

[la forge] 31/1/2019 12:44

The Baltic Times

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Total: New Global Supplier in the Lithuanian LNG Market

2019-01-31 TBT Staff

VILNIUS - Total, one of the biggest players in the global energy market, has joined the suppliers of liquefied natural gas (LNG) delivering LNG to Lithuania. Gas and electricity supplier Lietuvos Energijos Tiekimas (LET) signed a gas purchase agreement with an international company Total Gas & Power Limited.

According to the provisions of the agreement, LET is to acquire one LNG cargo from Total. The cargo purchased in the LNG spot market.

“We are delighted that Lithuania has a new LNG market player with a considerable experience and global recognition. Totalʼs LNG cargo will diversify LET’s gas portfolio and will enable it to offer its customers attractive prices and reliable supply,” Mantas Mikalajūnas, General Manager of LET, said.

Total’s cargo should reach Klaipeda at the beginning of the third quarter this year. The companies do not specify the price of the transaction or provide any other commercial details.

Lietuvos Energijos Tiekimas is the only company in the Baltic region which has gas supply from three different sources. The company has a long-term LNG supply agreement with the Norwegian company Equinor, it also buys gas in the LNG spot and short-term agreement market; besides, it purchases gas delivered through pipelines and uses the Latvian Inčukalns underground gas storage facility.

Total is the second LNG supplier in the world in terms of its size and occupies 10 % of the market. It is estimated that the Group will have taken into its control about the 40 million tons of annual LNG portfolio by 2020.

[waldron] 29/1/2019 08:49

Middle East gas reserves can be a catalyst for peace, Egypt minister says
Published an hour ago | Updated an hour ago
Holly Ellyatt
@HollyEllyatt




Key Points

Amid a push by Egypt to transform itself into a regional gas hub, it hosted the East Med Gas Hub earlier in January and gathered officials from Israel, Cyprus, Greece, Jordan, Italy and Palestine.
Speaking Monday at the BHGE Annual Meeting in Florence, Italy, Egypt Petroleum Minister Tarek El-Molla told CNBC that the commodity can aid the peace process in the region.

[florenceorbis] 28/1/2019 10:15

Qatar to order 60 new LNG carriers

[grupo guitarlumber] 21/1/2019 13:33

Trading of LNG derivatives to benefit industry
By Stephen Stapczynski and Dan Murtaugh on 1/21/2019

SINGAPORE (Bloomberg) -- With natural gas demand growing faster than for any other fossil fuel, LNG futures may be finally taking off.

Derivatives represented about 2% of global LNG production at the beginning of 2017 as an array of contracts around the world struggled to gain traction. But by the end of last year, volumes had grown to almost 23%, led by a burgeoning Intercontinental Exchange contract based on S&P Global Platts’ Japan-Korea Marker spot price assessments.

While volumes are a long way off established global energy benchmarks such as Brent crude -- where trade dwarfs worldwide oil production many times over -- the accelerating growth in LNG derivatives illustrates how the market is maturing. An explosion in supply, from the U.S. to Australia, is bringing more market participants and a shift away from traditional pricing.

“There’s more short-term physical trading indexed to JKM and new counterparties active in the market,” said Tobias Davis, head of LNG–Asia at brokerage Tullett Prebon. “This creates more liquidity and in turn, builds more confidence in trading the swap and using it as a viable hedging tool.”

There are now at least six derivative contracts for LNG, ranging from U.S. Gulf Coast futures on ICE to Dubai-Kuwait-India on Singapore Exchange. The most established by far is ICE’s Japan-Korea Marker, launched in 2012. More than 17,000 contracts traded in December, a 10-fold increase from January 2017. The next most active is CME Group’s futures contract, also based on S&P Global Platts’ JKM assessment. Its monthly volume peaked in November last year at 3,335 contracts.

The need for a liquid LNG benchmark has been the subject of much debate. Traditionally, when oil was used more commonly in power generation and production, it was almost exclusively valued relative to crude oil and brought and sold under long-term contracts. One advantage of that system is that oil has a liquid and established futures market that gives market participants visibility and the confidence to hedge.

But oil and gas don’t move in lockstep and buyers have become increasingly reluctant to be tied to crude markets. The expansion in global supply, most notably with the development of shale reserves that transformed the U.S. into a major natural gas exporter, has opened up other options and stimulated a shift to more spot trading.

About 27% of LNG was sold under spot- or short-term deals in 2017, up from 12% in 2003, according to the International Group of LNG Importers.

That just increased the need for a reliable price benchmark and liquid futures market for hedging. Regional gas benchmarks such as Louisiana’s Henry Hub, the U.K.’s National Balancing Point or Dutch Title Transfer Facility reflect local fundamentals and therefore may not be ideal proxies for the global LNG trade, where the vast majority of sales are in Asia. So that’s where LNG futures come in.

JKM “is much more trusted, much more accurate, and the paper market is helping make it be more responsive to price movements,” Gordon D Waters, the global head of LNG at ENGIE, said by phone on Friday. JKM contracts could reach the level of NBP or TTF “most likely within the next 5 years.” NBP and TTF volumes both averaged about 37,000 contracts a day in 2018.

There’s still a long way to go. ICE JKM is still much smaller than other global oil and gas benchmarks. Exchange open interest, or the amount of outstanding bets at the end of every day, accounted for about $2 billion at the end of 2018, compared with $36 billion for U.S. natural gas and more than $100 billion for Brent oil, according to Bloomberg estimates.

How the debate over natural gas pricing is playing out in Europe

For a futures market to be considered truly liquid, volumes should be about 10 times the size of the actual physical trade, according to Total SA, one of the world’s biggest producers and a major participant in the JKM market. With volumes multiplying by about three times a year, JKM should reach that level in about five years, Philip Olivier, Total’s general manager of global LNG, said in October.

European and U.S. players, international oil companies, banks, trading companies and some Australian producers make up the bulk of JKM’s contract liquidity, according to ENGIE’s Waters. “The big gap is the end buyer hedging activity, including the Japanese end users. They are not yet active,” he said.

Brent and U.S. gas traders also have much more flexibility, as they’re able to buy and sell futures by the second, with prices updating to reflect the fast-moving market. Most JKM LNG trades are still brokered offline and then cleared by exchanges. Contract values are based on a monthly average of Platts assessments, so the price updates once a day when the new assessment is added.

Still, LNG has already surpassed one energy derivative. ICE’s JKM contract now has more value in open interest than the exchange’s Newcastle coal contract. The two fuels, of course, also vie in the real world for space in power plants in some regions.

“If you have a look at how the coal market developed in the mid-2000s, it took over a decade to transition to a liquid exchange order book,” said Gordon Bennett, managing director for utility markets at ICE. “It definitely feels like JKM is evolving quicker."

[ariane] 15/1/2019 13:37

Natural Gas 15 Jan 2019 | 12:22 UTC London

German natural gas industry group slams latest US threats against Nord Stream 2

Author Stuart Elliott Editor Ikhhlaq Singh Aujla Commodity Natural Gas

Highlights

Erdgas chief says companies have 'sovereign' right to investment

US ambassador says investors 'undermining' Ukraine security

Nord Stream 2 on track to be completed by end-2019

London — German gas industry group Erdgas has strongly criticized the latest threats from the US against companies investing in the 55 Bcm/year Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline from Russia to Germany.
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The US ambassador to Berlin, Richard Grenell, wrote in a letter carried by Germany daily Handelsblatt that companies that support the building of Russian gas pipelines were "actively undermining Ukraine and Europe's security" and were still at significant risk of sanctions.

Five European companies -- Shell, Germany's Wintershall and Uniper, France's Engie and Austria's OMV -- have been helping to finance the construction of Nord Stream 2, which remains on track to come online by the end of 2019.

A US law applicable since August 2, 2017, gives the US president discretionary powers to impose sanctions on companies investing in Russian energy export pipelines, such as Nord Stream 2.

In a statement, Ergas chief Timm Kehler said European companies had the "sovereign" right to decide on their own investments.

"Sanctions against individual energy infrastructure projects not only limit the sovereignty of Europe, they also endanger the energy transition in Germany because they conflict with the need for more gas as a low-carbon energy source," Kehler said.

He said that every investment in gas infrastructure "strengthens the security of supply of Germany and Europe."
UKRAINE THREAT

Critics of Nord Stream 2 have said that the pipeline would increase Europe's dependence on one route and one source of gas, and also eliminate Ukraine's role as a transit country for Russian gas.

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Countries in Eastern Europe, the European Commission and the US government have all come out in opposition to the project.

"These partners share our deep concerns about Russia's increasingly aggressive behavior, especially Moscow's use of energy resources for political and economic leverage," Grenell wrote.

He said that Nord Stream 2 and the second line of the TurkStream gas pipeline would mean Russia could bypass Ukraine as a gas transit route to Europe.

"If this occurs, it could well mean the removal of a key strategic deterrent against Russian aggressive behavior in Ukraine," he said.

Ukraine transited some 87 Bcm of Russian gas to Europe in 2018, almost exactly the capacity of the planned Nord Stream 2 and TurkStream pipelines (55 + 31.5 Bcm).

In November last year, Ukraine's deputy minister for foreign affairs, Olena Zerkal, said at a conference in Berlin that Nord Stream 2 represented an "existential" threat to Ukraine.

She warned that if Russia no longer needed to use the Ukrainian transit system it could even lead to a "full-scale invasion" of Ukraine by Russia.

"The existence of the gas transportation system is an insurance for us," she said, pointing to the fact that Gazprom has no option but to use the Ukrainian system to guarantee its European gas revenues at present.

She also said the project "erodes European unity" given that a number of central and eastern European countries oppose the project.

--Stuart Elliott, [e-mail]

--Edited by Ikhhlaq Singh Aujla, [e-mail]

[ariane] 15/1/2019 11:00

0
14/01/2019 | 1:28 p.m.
According to a market source, Oddo BHF raised its target price on GTT from 70 to 84 euros while reiterating its recommendation for the purchase of its Forum 2019. The broker emphasizes in particular that the development of LNG fuel remains a a long-term catalyst with the implementation of the IMO regulation as of 2020 aimed at reducing sulfur emissions (SOx). The impact could be significant in the medium / long term.

[ariane] 14/1/2019 22:34

NYMEX February gas surges 49.2 cents to settle at $3.591/MMBtu on colder weather forecasts

Author Eric Janssen Editor Valarie Jackson Commodity Natural Gas

Houston — The NYMEX February natural gas futures contract jumped 49.2 cents in trading Monday to settle at $3.591/MMBtu with colder weather forecast for the eastern half of the US toward the end of the month.
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The 49.2-cent increase is the highest day-on-day jump for the NYMEX front-month contract since November 14.

Monday's surge also puts the front-month contract comfortably above $3/MMBtu, which it has only hit three times since the start of January.

Looking along the curve, NYMEX forward prices rose across the entire 2019 strip in Monday's trading.

The uptick in prices could be tied to forecasts of colder weather, with the most recent National Weather Service six- to 10-day and eight- to 14-day outlooks showing a likelihood of cooler-than-average weather from the Midwest to the East Coast, potentially giving US demand a boost.

Platts Analytics projects US demand to average 105.9 Bcf/d over the next 14 days, an uptick that could bring January demand closer to year-ago levels.

US demand has averaged 95.4 Bcf/d so far this month from 112.7 Bcf/d a year ago, Platts Analytics data shows.

Although US demand has been lower year on year, LNG feedgas volumes have nearly doubled, with Platts Analytics putting LNG feedgas at 4.8 Bcf/d month to date, up from 2.5 Bcf/d a year earlier.

High production in the US has continued through the month, with Platts Analytics data showing the US dry production has averaged 85 Bcf/d so far in January, a 12.7% year-on-year increase.

The NYMEX settlement price is considered preliminary and subject to change until a final settlement price is posted at 7 pm EST (0000 GMT Tuesday).

-- Eric Janssen, [e-mail]

-- Edited by Valarie Jackson, [e-mail]