Buoyed by record-level feedgas demand and several planned export terminals reaching important development milestones, 2025 was a banner year for U.S. LNG. Today, we’ll examine some of the sector’s near-term challenges and look at where demand could increase in the long term.
Crude oil production in the Permian may or may not have peaked — that’s TBD. What we do know is that even if the shale play’s oil output flatlines, the Permian will generate increasing volumes of natural gas (and NGLs) and virtually all of it will need to be piped to other markets, primarily the Gulf Coast to feed existing and planned LNG export terminals, gas-fired power plants and other large consumers. To keep pace with that undeniable need for more Permian-to-Gulf takeaway capacity, WhiteWater has announced plans, through its Matterhorn joint venture (JV), for yet another mountain-themed gas conduit to the coast. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss WhiteWater’s newly unveiled Eiger Express Pipeline.
Crude oil production in the Permian may or may not have peaked — that’s TBD. What we do know is that even if the shale play’s oil output flatlines, the Permian will generate increasing volumes of natural gas (and NGLs) and virtually all of it will need to be piped to other markets, primarily the Gulf Coast to feed existing and planned LNG export terminals, gas-fired power plants and other large consumers. To keep pace with that undeniable need for more Permian-to-Gulf takeaway capacity, WhiteWater has announced plans, through its Matterhorn joint venture (JV), for yet another mountain-themed gas conduit to the coast. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss WhiteWater’s newly unveiled Eiger Express Pipeline.
Odds are there’s never been a busier, more frantic time for natural-gas-related infrastructure development in Texas and Louisiana than right now. Construction is underway or imminent at no fewer than seven Gulf Coast LNG export terminals with a combined capacity of 16 Bcf/d.
Natural gas production in the Permian is still on a roll — increasing so fast that midstream infrastructure can barely keep up. But producers, marketers and shippers want more than new takeaway capacity. They also need to know that the pipeline systems they sign up with can reliably move their gas to markets where they can get the best price. Put simply, they are demanding optionality. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss the optionality provided by a WhiteWater Midstream-led joint venture’s (JV) expanding gas pipeline network in Texas, including a brand-new project between the Agua Dulce and Katy gas hubs that’s in the works.
The U.S. Gulf Coast is poised to experience another big wave of new LNG export capacity, and this time it will be joined by new capacity coming online in both Mexico and Canada. The more than 13 Bcf/d of incremental natural gas demand from North American LNG projects starting up over the next five years will have significant effects on U.S. and Canadian gas producers, gas flows and (quite likely) gas prices, which have been deeply depressed for more than a year now. In today’s RBN blog, we provide updates on the 10 LNG export projects in very advanced stages of development in the U.S., Mexico and Canada, detail the expected ramp-up in LNG-related gas demand and discuss the potential impact of rising LNG exports on gas prices.
A number of proposed liquefaction plants and LNG export terminals along the U.S. Gulf Coast are racing to secure regulatory approvals and line up sales and purchase agreements, all in the hope of reaching final investment decisions before their rivals. Yet, these Texas and Louisiana projects now face competition from a facility that would be sited more than 3,000 miles away, in the icy waters just off the North Slope of Alaska. Qilak LNG would use a “near-shore” liquefaction plant in the Beaufort Sea off Point Thomson, AK, to supercool the region’s nearby, abundant and now largely stranded supplies of natural gas, load the resulting LNG onto ice-breaking carriers, and use these carriers to make shuttle runs to and from LNG customers in Asia. Today, we review the Qilak LNG project and the economic and logistic rationales driving it.
As exports of crude oil, natural gas and NGLs have surged, U.S. markets for these energy commodities have undergone radical transformations. Exports now dominate the supply/demand equilibrium. These markets simply would not clear at today’s production levels, much less at the volumes coming on over the next few years, if not for access to global markets. It is more important than ever to understand how the markets for crude, gas and NGLs are tied together, and how the interdependencies among the commodities will impact the future of energy supply, demand, exports and, ultimately, prices. Making sense of these energy market fundamentals is what RBN’s School of Energy is about. Warning! Today’s blog is a blatant commercial for our upcoming Houston conference. But we hope you will read on, because this time around, our curriculum includes all the topics we have always covered at School of Energy, PLUS five all-new sessions dedicated to export markets.
In only three years, the international liquefied natural gas (LNG) market has undergone a major transformation. The old order, founded on long-term, bilateral contracts with LNG prices linked to crude oil prices, is being replaced by a more-fluid, more-competitive paradigm. That’s good news for LNG buyers, who are benefiting from a supply glut and lower LNG prices—the twin results of slower-than-expected demand growth in 2014-15 and the addition of several new liquefaction/LNG export facilities in Australia and the U.S. But the new paradigm poses a challenge for facility developers: How do they line up commitments for new liquefaction/LNG export capacity that will be needed a few years from now in a market characterized by LNG oversupply and rock-bottom prices? Today we begin a two-part series that considers the hurdles developers face and which types of projects may have the best prospects.
Five years ago, the U.S. was a net importer of propane and butanes, those products collectively called LPG, or liquefied petroleum gasses. Back then, demand from residential, commercial, refining and chemical markets slightly exceeded supply for the products. But then came shale, and LPG production from natural gas processing more than doubled, from 0.8 Mb/d to 1.7 Mb/d. Suddenly the U.S. was a net exporter—a very big exporter at that. Last year roughly half of all LPG from U.S. gas processing plants was exported, with the vast majority shipped to overseas markets. All those exports are now having an outsized impact on pipeline flows, inventories and prices. Consequently, it is increasingly important to keep close tabs not only on export volumes but on which export terminals are handling all these volumes, and where the LPG is heading. Today we discuss the current state of the LPG export market and insights on it from RBN’s most recent NGL Voyager Report. Warning, today’s blog includes a subliminal promo for the report.
