The US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has approved NextDecade’s plan to reduce the number of trains its proposed Rio Grande LNG export facility.
To save costs, the developer has put forward a plan to construct five trains instead of six.
In addition, FERC said it agreed that the developer could increase the liquefaction capacity of each of the five remaining trains to keep the total maximum export capacity at 27 mill tonnes per year.
The design modifications that would allow the changes were also approved.
However, sources said that it was not certain whether NextDecade would build all five trains, or whether the project would even go ahead.
Thus far, Shell 's 20-year agreement to buy 2 mill tonnes per year of supply from Rio Grande is the only firm offtake deal tied to the terminal announced.
NextDecade has said that needed to sell another 9 mill mill tonnes under long-term contracts to achieve FID on two or three trains at Rio Grande.
Rio Grande LNG was originally planned with six trains, each capable of producing 4.5 mill tonnes per year year of LNG.
