Natural Gas

Despite setbacks caused by Hurricane Ike, Cheniere Energy has completed 84% of its LNG terminal at Sabine Pass and expects to be finished by the third quarter of 2009.

Ike’s damage was limited to some temporary facilities and construction materials, Cheniere reported in its quarterly financial posting last week. Everything lost is being replaced.

Damage was caused to some temporary facilities and construction materials and these are being replaced as required, Cheniere said.

Cheniere is developing a network of three LNG receiving terminals and natural gas pipelines along the Gulf Coast. In its third-quarter report, the company reported a net loss of $67.4 million, compared with a loss of $53.5 million last year, with operating losses down to $39.1 million compared with $47.3 million for the same period last year.

Cheniere completed construction of the first phase of the Sabine Pass terminal this year. The terminal will have an import capacity of 2.6 billion cubic feet per day of LNG, though commissioning is not expected to be complete until the first quarter of 2009. The expansion phase will add another 1.4 billion cubic feet per day.

Even before the commissioning date, Cheniere will be facing some big challenges. The first being that the U.S. has never really been an attractive first-market for LNG. Asia gets that spot.

Stay tuned. More to come. With a new president coming into office who likes natural gas as a key U.S. power source, LNG imports may become even more important in the big picture.

–John A. Sullivan, News Editor, Oil and Gas Investor, www.OilandGasInvestor.com, jsullivan@hartenergy.com

You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.