U.S. LNG company Freeport LNG said on Aug. 11 it was still pulling in small amounts of natural gas from pipelines at its shuttered LNG export plant in Texas to fuel a power plant.
The company has said it expects the liquefaction plant, which shut due to a fire on June 8, to return to at least partial service in early October.
U.S. gas futures jumped about 8% on Aug. 11 on talk of increased gas flows to the Freeport LNG plant, a drop in gas output and forecasts for more demand for the fuel over the next two weeks than previously expected.
Freeport LNG started to pull in small amounts of pipeline gas to feed a power plant that sold electricity to the Texas grid in mid-July.
Meanwhile, Freeport LNG retracted the force majeure it initially declared after the explosion in June, a development that could cost its buyers billions of dollars in losses.
"Freeport LNG is currently drawing a small amount of gas off pipeline connections...to fuel a gas-turbine generator at its natural gas pretreatment facility in order to generate and export about 50 [megawatts] of power to the state’s electricity grid," Freeport LNG spokesperson Heather Browne said in an email.
Data provider Refinitiv said about 22 MMcf/d of gas flowed to the plant from July 19 until earlier this week.
That compares with an average of 2.0 Bcf/d during the month before the plant shut.
Gas markets in the United States and Europe have swung wildly on developments at the Freeport LNG plant. Prices in Europe jumped about 40% in the week after the plant shut because the world was already short on gas supplies due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February.
Recommended Reading
Honeywell Bags Air Products’ LNG Process, Equipment Business for $1.8B
2024-07-10 - Honeywell is growing its energy transition services offerings with the acquisition of Air Products’ LNG process technology and equipment business for $1.81 billion.
TGS Awarded Ocean Bottom Node Data Acquisition Contract in North America
2024-07-17 - The six-month contract was granted by a returning client for TGS to back up the client’s seismic data capabilities for informed decision making.
PGS Gets Greenlight to Begin Surveying for Petrobras 4D Contract
2024-05-30 - After a long permitting process, PGS has secured the last permit needed to begin its large 4D survey contract with Petrobras at the Barracuda-Caratinga field offshore Brazil.
Chemex Agrees to FEED Contract for Verde’s NatGas-to-gasoline Plant
2024-06-05 - Verde said the project will be located in Martin County, Texas. Completion of Chemex’s FEED work is anticipated in early 2025.
Exclusive: Blue Latitudes’ Ever-evolving Process to Decommission Offshore Rigs to Reefs
2024-06-05 - Environmental consulting firm Blue Latitudes looks at decommissioned offshore rigs as potential fisheries habitats, and the process is always evolving as the energy industry evolves, Amber Sparks, co-founder of Blue Latitudes, told Hart Energy's Jordan Blum at the Offshore Technology Conference.