How gas prices and projects move in the United States
In the United States, gas prices are rising above $ 9 per million Btu, the highest value since 2008. Meanwhile, LNG demand stimulates projects, but inflation drives up labor and material costs. All the details
On Thursday, for the first time since August 2008, the prices of natural gas futures in the United States rose above $ 9 per million British thermal units (Btu). This is a problem, because the inflation rate in the country is already very high and the increase in the price of gas will have an impact on practically everything, from costs for domestic heating to production costs in factories.
THE REASONS
According to David Givens, an analyst at Argus quoted by CNBC , the reasons for this increase in fuel prices are three: the poor growth of production, the high levels of exports of liquefied gas (LNG) and the low values of storage, for 17 per about one hundred below the average of the last five years.
WHAT THE UNITED STATES DO ABOUT LIQUEFIED GAS EXPORT
In April – in correspondence with the drop in gas demand in the Northern Hemisphere, given the end of the cold season – Qatar once again became the world's leading LNG exporter, surpassing the United States, with more than 7.5 million tons.
The overtaking of Doha on Washington is also linked to the decline in American output: the companies that manage the export terminals took advantage of the end of winter to start work on the plants.
According to analysts, once the Calcasieu Pass terminal goes into operation – it is located in Louisiana, and is owned by Venture Global LNG – by the end of the year, the United States will reach an LNG production capacity equal to 13.9 billion cubic feet per day.
Also in Louisiana, in recent days Venture Global has closed a loan of 13.2 billion dollars for the construction of the Plaquemines project on LNG. It is the first terminal approved in the country after the invasion of Ukraine increased the demand for non-Russian gas supplies. The United States has reached an agreement with the European Union to supply it with 15 billion cubic meters of LNG in 2022.
THE UNLOCKING OF PROJECTS
Strong European demand for LNG, Reuters reported, is giving new impetus to some long-stalled export projects in the United States. The problem is that the cost of labor, equipment and materials (steel and nickel, above all) is very high due to inflation, and therefore developing these plants will be complex.
THE NEW MODULAR DESIGNS
There is also a theme of technological advancement: the projects presented long ago could have much higher construction costs than the most recent ones, which use modular designs designed on purpose to be faster to assemble and cheaper.
For example, New Fortress Energy is using Baker Hughes' modular liquefaction units. In the aforementioned Calcasieu Pass terminal, Venture Global is installing eighteen modular units: the intervention has a cost of 580 million dollars per ton of LNG, 26 percent cheaper than the first export facilities.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/energia/prezzi-gas-stati-uniti/ on Mon, 30 May 2022 08:34:42 +0000.