{"id":759,"date":"2018-05-17T17:38:33","date_gmt":"2018-05-17T17:38:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/euromenaenergy.com\/?p=759"},"modified":"2018-05-17T17:38:33","modified_gmt":"2018-05-17T17:38:33","slug":"europe-awakens-for-lng-to-rival-china-as-own-gas-runs-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/?p=759","title":{"rendered":"Europe Awakens for LNG to Rival China as Own Gas Runs Out"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Europe is starting to steal some of the limelight from China\u2019s booming liquefied natural gas demand as imports pick up after several lackluster years.<\/p>\n

Europe and China will be comparable in significance as importing regions in the coming years, Cheniere Energy Inc. said, citing data from Wood Mackenzie Ltd. That follows \u201cabsolutely phenomenal\u201d growth in China last year, Andrew Walker, vice president for strategy at the company that pioneered the transformation of the U.S. shale boom into global exports, said in Amsterdam.<\/div>\n
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China\u2019s LNG\u00a0consumption\u00a0leapt 42 percent last year to almost match European imports, which climbed 20 percent. Whereas the Asian nation needs the fuel mostly to replace dirtier coal, Europe needs it to offset rapidly declining domestic production.<\/div>\n
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The re-emergence of Europe as an LNG market has caught the eye of the coming wave of U.S. fuel producers. Venture Global LNG, Inc., which is developing export terminals in Louisiana, sees Europe as \u201cone of the biggest surprises,\u201d it said at the Flame conference in Amsterdam.<\/div>\n
Europe\u2019s location may give it an edge over generally higher-priced markets in Asia when it comes to attracting the increasing volumes produced in the Atlantic. North America and Russia were seen providing most of the new supply from 2025 to 2030, according to a poll at Flame.<\/div>\n
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Demand growth in China and South Korea, the second and third biggest LNG importers, will cool during the rest of this year after continued expansion through April, according to Cedigaz, a Paris-based industry research group. With less appetite also from Japan, the biggest buyer, northern Europe will step in to balance the markets, Cedigaz\u2019s secretary general Geoffroy Hureau said at Flame.<\/p>\n

U.K. supply this summer may be low but the Netherlands will see a pick up as it rushes to offset lower own production and higher demand for storage, Nick Boyes, a senior gas and LNG analyst at Axpo Trading AG, said by email. France will also need more for storage, he said.<\/p>\n

The Netherlands is taking the lead also because of lack of storage demand in Britain after the closure of the Rough facility. The Dutch market is so hot that the country\u2019s Title Transfer Facility hub will be the\u00a0main reference for LNG trading in the next three to four months, Ruben Tomas, lead LNG trader at Germany\u2019s Uniper SE\u2019s commodity unit, said on a panel.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe see a well-supplied Atlantic Basin this summer\u201d as Russia\u2019s Yamal LNG and U.S. projects fill the market with cargoes, Axpo\u2019s Boyes said. Trinidad & Tobago and Angola are also boosting supply, while demand in southern Europe and Egypt is declining, he said.<\/p>\n

While the usage rate of LNG terminals in Europe was just 23 percent last year, things are looking up, according to Arturo Gallego Diaz, head of LNG trading and operations at\u00a0Centrica Plc.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are more and more people looking at northwest Europe as an opportunity to deliver volumes that are produced in the Atlantic basin,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Declining production in the North Sea and the Dutch Groningen field as well as the closing of coal plants in Europe have a \u201cbig impact on LNG production\u201d and are \u201ca very big demand surprise,\u201d Venture Global LNG Chief Commercial Officer Tom Earl said at Flame. The company recently\u00a0signed\u00a0a supply contract with Portugal\u2019s Galp Energia SGPS SA.<\/p>\n

\u2018Fairly Stable\u2019<\/h3>\n

Creditworthy counterparts, liquid hubs and physical demand help make Europe attractive for LNG, according to Gallego Diaz.<\/p>\n

Uniper expects \u201cfairly stable\u201d demand for gas in Europe, while seeing growth in gas-to-power and potentially transport, said Gregor Pett, executive vice president for market analytics.<\/p>\n

Russia, Europe\u2019s biggest gas supplier, sees higher demand for its pipeline gas, undermining the region\u2019s efforts at diversification, according to Sergei Komlev, head of the contract structuring and price formation directorate at Gazprom PJSC\u2019s export unit.<\/p>\n

While Russia will continue to pipe natural gas to Europe in competition with LNG, both can co-exist, the Centrica and Uniper executives said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think they exclude each other,\u201d Uniper\u2019s Pett said. \u201cEveryone has a place.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Europe is starting to steal some of the limelight from China\u2019s booming liquefied natural gas demand as imports pick up after several lackluster years. Europe and China will be comparable in significance…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[57,69,70,110,119,136,149,203,233,246,248],"class_list":["post-759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-baroudi","tag-centrica","tag-cheniere","tag-energia","tag-eu","tag-gallego","tag-groningen","tag-oil-and-gas","tag-qatar","tag-roudi","tag-roudibaroudi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}