LNG

Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. (ADNOC), the main oil and gas company of the United Arab Emirates, has as expected made a final investment decision to build a second LNG export plant sited in the industrial city of Ruwais and has also awarded engineering contracts.

ADNOC Gas, the energy company in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, plans to invest $13 billion in domestic and international opportunities in the next five years and aims to more than double its LNG production capacity by 2028.

Inpex Corp., the Japanese liquefied natural gas producer and project developer, has joined with LNG importers Tokyo Gas and Osaka Gas to conduct a joint study on e-methane production with the largest clean energy company in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.

McDermott, the US energy and LNG project engineering company, has outlined part of the scope of the planned Fujairah LNG production facility being developed in the fifth-largest emirate by area of the seven United Arab Emirates.

McDermott was awarded the contract by Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. (Adnoc) to provide front-end engineering and design for the plant.

The Fujairah project will be centred around a liquefaction plant with a total capacity of 9.6 million tonnes per annum.

Fujairah is located outside the Arabian Gulf on the Gulf of Oman. The shores of Fujairah extend for 70 kilometres along the coast from the city of Fujairah.

The emirate shares its boundaries with the emirates of Sharjah and Ras Al Khaimah to the west and the south respectively.

In the north, Fujairah shares its international border with the Sultanate of Oman, an established LNG producer supplying customers in Asia.

Electric drives

“The plant will be designed with electric drives for the liquefaction compressors and will incorporate several features that significantly reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, capitalizing on the experience McDermott,” said the Houston, Texas-based company.

McDermott said the Fujairah plant would benefit from the “robust capabilities and experience” of the US company in FEED performance.

Our biggest differentiator is our ability to execute this FEED on a fast-track basis incorporating all of the characteristics required to support the award of EPC contracts which are expected in 2023,” said Tareq Kawash, Senior Vice President for Onshore at McDermott.

McDermott was involved in initial phases of Adnoc’s LNG development in the late 1980s that resulted in the Das Island plant in Abu Dhabi, the second-largest emirate after Dubai.

The US company constructed the storage facilities for both LNG and liquified petroleum gas (LPG) on an EPC basis on Das Island.

“We are proud to continue our long history with Adnoc by playing an important role in helping to define the next phase of LNG development in the UAE,” added Kawash.

McDermott noted that it was one of the most experienced engineering and construction firms serving the LNG market and has delivered more than 30 LNG Pre-FEED and FEED projects over the past 10 years.

The Fujairah LNG facilities FEED will be performed by teams in McDermott's offices in London and the UAE.

Intercontinental Exchange, the leading global provider of trading platforms and clearing, said US bank Morgan Stanley and Co. had become the latest Exchange and Clearing member for ICE’s newest exchange, the ICE Futures Abu Dhabi (IFAD) platform in the United Arab Emirates.

The IFAD membership now stands at a total of 29 firms and banks, listed at the end.

IFAD launched trading at the end of March 2021 in ICE Murban Crude Oil Futures and 18 Murban-related cash settled derivatives and inter-commodity spreads, offering the market a broad range of ways to trade and hedge Murban crude oil.

Contracts traded on IFAD are cleared at ICE Clear Europe where they are cleared alongside ICE’s global energy futures platform covering oil, natural gas and the environmental complex, allowing customers to benefit from critical margin offsets to enhance capital efficiency.

Produced by Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. (ADNOC), Murban is the UAE’s largest crude by volume, with daily production capacity of up to 2 million barrels.

IFAD saw record open interest of 53,515 contracts on May 18, with 48,440 of that total in the ICE Murban Crude Oil futures contract.

A total of 282,692 contracts have traded since the launch, equivalent to 282 million barrels of Murban Crude oil.

This includes 275,507 ICE Murban Crude Oil futures contracts and 7,185 Murban-related cash settled derivatives, with 55 firms having traded on IFAD since the launch.
Average Daily Volume in Murban Crude Oil Futures is 7,210 contracts.

“All the key metrics you look for to judge the traction of a new benchmark in the market - volumes, open interest, number and range of participants, and the depth of the curve - are all increasing,” said Jamal Oulhadj, President of ICE Futures Abu Dhabi.

“This really reflects how the energy industry is utilizing its new ability to hedge forward price risk for Murban crude and contribute to the price formation process of Murban crude oil,” Oulhadj explained.

In addition to producing Murban crude, ADNOC is a growing natural developer, including unconventional gas projects as well as operating the liquefaction and LNG export plant on Das Island.

The pioneering Das Island plant shipped its first cargo in 1977 and produces about 6 million tonnes per annum of LNG as the oldest in the Arab world after Algeria’s Arzew plant.

The plant’s LNG Trains are essential parts of the national resources for storage and export operations and is currently the subject of a rejuvenation programme.
IFAD has 29 Exchange members and 22 Clearing members.

Clearing members stand behind all trades made through IFAD and cleared by ICE Clear Europe, whether it is for the account of a customer, member or their own account.

Murban futures are open for trading for 24 hours a day on Mondays and 22 hours a day Tuesdays to Fridays, with investors from jurisdictions including Abu Dhabi, the US, Singapore, the UK, Switzerland, the Netherlands, France, Norway, Australia, Japan and South Korea, able to trade on IFAD.

The 29 members are: ABN AMRO Clearing Bank; ABN AMRO Clearing Chicago LLC; ADM Investor Services International Ltd; ADM Investor Services; Advantage Futures; BNP Paribas; Banco Santander; Citigroup Global Markets; G.H. Financials Ltd; Goldman Sachs and Co; Goldman Sachs International; HSBC Bank Plc; J.P. Morgan Securities; Marex Financial; Mercuria International; Mizuho Securities USA; Morgan Stanley & Co.; Onyx Commodities Ltd; PVM Oil Futures Ltd; PVM Oil Futures Pte Ltd; Phillip Capital; R.J. O'Brien & Associates; Societe Generale International; StoneX Financial; TP ICAP Markets Ltd; Tower Research Capital Europe; Tullett Prebon (Europe) Ltd; Vercer Capital Markets Trading Ltd; Wedbush Securities.

Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), the longest-standing LNG producer in the Middle East for the United Arab Emirates, which is the third-largest oil producer in OPEC, is expected to proceed with an initial public offering of a stake in the ADNOC Drilling company with operations on land and sea.

Dec 10 (LNGJ) - Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. (Adnoc) signed an exploration concession agreement for onshore Block 5 with Occidental Petroleum of the US, the company which sold the Mozambique LNG project to French major Total after acquiring it with its Anadarko Petroleum acquisition in 2019.

   The award has been approved by Abu Dhabi’s Supreme Petroleum Council (SPC) and follows the SPC’s endorsement in November of Adnoc awarding exploration blocks in Abu Dhabi’s second competitive block bid round. Occidental will hold a 100 percent stake in the exploration phase, investing up to 514 million United Arab Emirates dirhams ($140 million), including a participation fee, to explore for and appraise oil and gas opportunities in the block that covers an onshore area of 4,212 square kilometres southeast of Abu Dhabi city.

The Abu Dhabi Supreme Petroleum Council (SPC) has approved 448 billion dirhams ($122 billion) in capital expenditure for national oil and gas company and LNG exporter Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. (Adnoc) through 2025 as it also pursues growing joint ventures, especially in unconventional natural gas to make the United Arab Emirates self sufficient.

Italian natural gas network operator Snam, one of Europe’s leading energy infrastructure companies and operator of two LNG import terminals, reported an almost 4 percent rise in nine-month revenues to €2.03 billion ($2.40Bln) even as natural gas demand dropped because of Covid-19 lockdowns.

Abu Dhabi National Oil Co. (Adnoc) has signed two-year LNG supply agreements with BP of the UK and French major Total for the majority of its production through the first quarter of 2022 after scaling back its supplies to Japan.