Sabine Pass LNG

U.S. LNG exports have climbed from zero three years ago to more than 3 Bcf/d now, and export capacity is set to grow to more than 10 Bcf/d by 2023. With the U.S. emerging as a dominant player in the global LNG landscape, international players are now increasingly susceptible to the day-to-day fluctuations of the U.S. natural gas market — a highly liquid, fungible and interconnected arena that’s propelled by constantly shifting transportation economics. The global LNG market inevitably is also moving toward spot-oriented trading based on short-term economic conditions. Thus, prospective buyers of U.S. LNG considering pre-FID projects increasingly need to understand the ever-changing U.S. gas flow and pricing dynamics. At the same time, U.S. market participants trying to understand how 10 Bcf/d of LNG exports will affect the domestic market also will need to closely track LNG activity, including feedgas flows and prices. In today’s blog — which launches our new LNG Voyager service — we look at how U.S. onshore gas market dynamics are affecting gas supply costs at the Sabine Pass LNG facility, and considers what this might mean for several of the pre-FID projects.

Natural gas flows and market dynamics are shifting at national benchmark Henry Hub. Supply receipts at Henry this year to date have doubled since the comparable period last year to nearly 450 MMcf/d, on average. That’s also a five-fold increase from the same period in 2016. In fact, current gas flows through the hub are the highest we’ve seen since 2009. The last time we saw this level of flows through the hub was when Gulf of Mexico offshore gas production volumes — much of which hit the U.S. pipeline system in southern Louisiana — were still topping 6.0 Bcf/d. That was also before the Marcellus/Utica Shale gas supply ballooned, effectively emptying out the pipeline capacity that used to flow gas north from the Gulf Coast. Now, many of those pipelines have reversed flows and the hub is showing signs of becoming a destination market for that Northeast gas and other supply targeting LNG export demand on the Gulf Coast. Today, we continue our short series looking at the changing physical flows at Henry Hub.

For decades, liquidity at the U.S. natural gas benchmark pricing location Henry Hub in Louisiana has been dominated by financial trades, with minimal physical exchange of gas, despite the hub boasting robust physical infrastructure, including ample pipeline connectivity. But that’s changing. Between the start of LNG exports from Cheniere Energy’s Sabine Pass LNG facility in February 2016, and the slew of pipeline reversals that are allowing Marcellus/Utica producers to target the new Gulf Coast demand, gas flows through Henry have been rising. In fact, more physical gas is moving through the hub than in nearly 10 years, to the point where a key pipeline interconnect is at capacity on many days, which historically was unheard of. Today, we begin a short series looking at the changing physical market at Henry.  

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.

U.S. LNG exports via Cheniere Energy’s Sabine Pass LNG export facility are poised to be a major demand driver of the domestic natural gas market in 2017. Pipeline deliveries to the terminal have more than tripled since mid-2016 and are set to climb further as more liquefaction capacity ramps up. With two liquefaction trains already operational, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission last month approved Train 3 to begin operations and also green-lighted the start-up of Train 4 commissioning. Today, we provide an update of Sabine Pass’s export activity and its potential effect on U.S. gas demand this year.

The site of Cheniere Energy’s new liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal in Corpus Christi is only a short drive from the heart of the Eagle Ford. But for supply diversity’s sake, Cheniere won’t depend only on Eagle Ford gas for supply—far from it, in fact. Plans are in the works to enable Corpus Christi LNG’s five planned liquefaction “trains” to access gas from a wide variety of shale plays and basins, in some cases moving gas long-distance. Today, we continue our look at the challenges of securing and moving huge volumes of gas to LNG export terminals, the emerging epicenters of U.S. gas demand.