LNG

Sanctioned Arctic LNG 2 has already despatched more LNG to China this year than in the whole of 2025. LNG Journal's own research shows 24 cargoes totalling 1.49 MMt sailed for China by 16 July on a sailed-date basis, against 17 cargoes and 1.05 MMt across all of last year, a total passed as early as 19 May.

One US LNG cargo reached China on 16 July, the first in seventeen months, but it may never be imported. Our tracking shows the Al Fat'h diverted from Huizhou, an ordinary customs berth, to bonded Yangpu, where a cargo can wait, clear customs, or leave again with duty never falling due. Which of those happens is not yet knowable, and Beijing's tariff on US LNG still stands.

China has received its first US LNG cargo in nearly 1.5 years, with the Al Fat’h carrier – loaded at Plaquemines in early June – berthing and discharging at Yangpu LNG terminal in Hainan, southern China. Al Fat'h's charterer is reportedly QatarEnergy LNG, which has a 3 mtpa supply obligation with PetroChina.

Beihai LNG in Guangxi has discharged 26 cargoes this year to 13 July, and every one of them came from Russia. That intake marks the terminal’s second-busiest first half in eight years, behind only 2024, and ten cargoes more than it took over the same window last year. The berth is working at its usual rate. Nothing else has come through it.

ADNOC Logistics & Services has placed an order for four LNG carriers at China’s Jiangnan Shipyard in a deal valued at around US$900 million. Each of the newbuild vessels will have a capacity of 175 000 cubic meters and is scheduled for delivery in 2029.

Limited shipbuilding capacity in South Korea and China could slow down a record expansion of global LNG supply. One of the industry’s dependencies – the ability to physically move gas – rests on a supply chain it cannot control and cannot quickly replicate, Ikram Elloumi, director of research at Wood Mackenzie warns.

LNG Canada passed a year of exports with feedgas near Phase 1 capacity. Across 106 loadings since the first sailing from LNG Canada since last June, South Korea took the largest single share, roughly one cargo in three, ahead of Japan at a quarter and China at just over a fifth.

Russia’s Novatek has begun its 2026 summer Arctic LNG shipping season with simultaneous eastbound cargoes from its Yamal LNG and Arctic LNG 2 projects via the Northern Sea Route – in the face of Western sanctions and ongoing technical constraints at Arctic LNG 2.

China’s LNG imports in June are expected to be broadly unchanged from a year earlier at around 5.29 million tonnes, according to Kpler data cited by Bloomberg. The forecast implies a month-on-month increase from May imports of 4.9 million tonnes, as demand strengthens ahead of peak summer cooling, driven by higher air-conditioning use.

Asian countries are stepping up investment in domestic energy to curb reliance on imported LNG, as energy security overtakes cost following the three-month disruption of the Strait of Hormuz. China, India and Pakistan are accelerating spending on coal, renewables and nuclear power to reduce exposure to LNG imports.