The company projected global LNG production to increase by 3 Bcf/day next year, with some of this capacity pushed back from 2010 due to maintenance outages and a delay in the startup of two new Qatari mega trains. Barclays Capital added that it lowered its estimates for global LNG growth to 4 Bcf/day this year from more than 6 Bcf/day earlier.
Global LNG output was 23.48 Bcf/day in 2009, according to the BP Statistical Review of World Energy published in June 2010.
"The experience of the past 18 months has highlighted the flexibility of the the supply chain in adapting to the pace of demand increases," Barclays Capital said. The company added that global LNG deliveries for the first half of 2010 increased by 5.7 Bcf/day on the back of extremely cold weather in the first quarter this year, outstripping its growth projection of 4.7-5.5 Bcf/day for 2010's global LNG output.
Barclays Capital said the top five LNG producers -- Qatar, Indonesia,Malaysia, Australia and Nigeria -- had smoothed out the arrival of new LNG supplies in 2010 and 2011 through various means.
Qatar's underperfomance in adding new supply this year was due to various delays in the start of new facilities and also to a wave of maintenance outages during the summer season that "significantly limited output," Barclays Capital said, with the outages instrumental in keeping the market balanced from April through July this year by curtailing more than 2 Bcf/day of LNG.
The last two Qatari LNG trains, Qatargas 3 and 4, each with a respective capacity of 7.8 million mt/year are expected to start commercial operations in Q1 and Q2 2011 after having been delayed, but Barclays Capital did not say by how long the start of both trains had been set back. Qatargas said in mid-June that Qatargas 3 and 4 were due to start production by Q4 2010.
"The steady recovery of Nigerian LNG production from its 2009 lows has offset a significant part of the Qatari production declines in the first six months of this year," the report said, "The main beneficiaries of this increased output have been Spain and France, which have long-term contracts
with Nigeria, although the US has picked up incremental Nigerian volumes."
A restart at the Soku facility and restored feed gas supply to the Bonny liquefaction terminal enabled Nigerian output to grow by 0.7 Bcf/day in the first half of 2010.
Declining production at the Arun and Bontang facilities would balance out increased output at Tangguh for Indonesia, the report said. Barclays Capital said Arun's production would decline further in 2011 with 31 cargoes, down from 36 LNG shipments this year. But growing domestic demand could help to offset the excess LNG that would be available on the back of two supply contracts to Japan expiring at the end of 2010 and 2011, respectively.
The report also said exports of LNG from Malaysia continue to remain stable at 3 Bcf/day, but in the long run growing domestic requirements could see the country becoming an LNG importer by 2014.
"LNG exports from Australia are running near capacity at 2.4 Bcf/day, and are 3% higher than last year for the first half of 2010," Barclays Capital said, adding that the launch of the country's seventh liquefaction train with a capacity of 4.3 million mt/year at the Pluto LNG project in the first half of 2011 would make Australia the world's third largest LNG supplier after Qatar and Indonesia.
Barclays Capital added that Peru has entered the ranks of LNG producers with the start of its 4.4 million mt/year Camisea LNG facility in June, while Russian Sakhalin 2's 9.6 million mt/year liquefaction plant has been running at or above capacity in 2010.
China Chemical Weekly: http://news.chemnet.com/en/detail-1411716.html
