LNG

JERA Co Inc., the largest Japanese LNG buyer, said it signed an accord with ExxonMobil and the city government of the Vietnamese port of Haiphong to work together on a potential integrated LNG-to-Power project for the Port.

Vietnam is making progress on developing four LNG import terminals and the latest to make a statement is one venture planned for the port city of Haiphong involving US major ExxonMobil Corp.

The governing People's Committee of Haiphong said it had approved a $5 billion LNG import terminal and power project scheduled to come on stream by 2026.

“The terminal will have a capacity of 6 million tonnes of LNG per annual and a power project built in two stages with a final generation capacity of 4,500 megawatts,” said the Haiphong authorities.

However. ExxonMobil has yet to confirm the venture, though one of its senior executives recently held talks with the Vietnamese Prime Minister.

A second Vietnamese LNG-for-Power venture is being developed by Singapore-based company Delta Offshore at Bac Lieu province in the Mekong Delta.

This project will also be built in four phases and is scheduled to be built by 2026.

A third LNG terminal is envisaged adjacent to a gas-fired power station in Ninh Thuan province, south of Cam Ranh Bay.

The fourth project is at Long An, also on the Mekong Delta, and this will see the development of a 3,000MW power plant.

Vietnam said in June 2020 that talks had taken place by telephone between Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Irtiza Sayyed, President of ExxonMobil LNG Market Development, on LNG imports and power facilities.


The Hanoi government said in a statement at the time that a power project in Haiphong could use LNG imported from the United States or other countries.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc had said he welcomed ExxonMobil’s willingness to invest in Vietnam in many areas, including natural gas exploration and LNG, petrochemical refining and electricity production from LNG.

ExxonMobil’s main US LNG export interests are as a shareholder in the Qatar Petroleum-led Golden Pass export project in Texas.

Qatar Petroleum owns 70 percent of the Golden Pass joint venture and ExxonMobil holds 30 percent.

Originally built as an import facility on the Sabine-Neches Waterway in Texas before the shale-gas revolution, Golden Pass will be reconfigured to export up to 15.6 million tonnes per annum of LNG.

The Bac Lieu project of Delta Offshore is the most advanced of the planned Vietnamese LNG terminal build-out and said in September 2020 it had signed a technology license agreement with Stena Power and LNG Solutions for jetty-less LNG receiving and regasification technology.

The Mekong Delta facility will employ Stena’s Autonomous Transfer System (ATS) and Self-installing Regas Platform (SRP) solutions to provide energy for its power plants.

Vietnam said it was in talks with US major ExxonMobil Corp. on the possibility of investing in new projects to develop liquefied natural gas imports for the southeast Asian nation to meet increasing power needs and it was seeking US shipments.

The government in Hanoi issued a statement that Vietnam welcomed ExxonMobil’s interest in the provision of new investment.

It issued the statement after a phone call between Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Irtiza Sayyed, President of ExxonMobil LNG Market Development Inc.

“Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc welcomed ExxonMobil’s plan to invest in Vietnam in many areas, including natural gas exploration and LNG, petrochemical refining and electricity production from LNG,” said the government.

“The Prime Minister affirmed that ExxonMobil's cooperation is very important, contributing to the joint cooperation between Vietnam and the United States, especially this year to celebrate the 25th anniversary of establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries,” it added.

The statement mentioned in particular ExxonMobil possibly investing in the development of the LNG-for-power chain with a capacity of about 3,000 megawatts in Long An in the Mekong Delta region of southern Vietnam.

“For this, ExxonMobil will ensure a continuous supply of LNG directly from the United States and from several other countries. LNG import will contribute to creating a harmonious trade balance between Vietnam and the US,” said the Vietnamese.

The government added that another possible project was the 4,000-MW LNG-for-power plant in the northern port city of Haiphong, adding that this could be completed between 2025 and 2030.

ExxonMobil’s main US LNG export interests are as a shareholder in the Qatar Petroleum-led Golden Pass export project in Texas.

Qatar Petroleum owns 70 percent of the Golden Pass joint venture and ExxonMobil holds 30 percent.

Originally built as an import facility on the Sabine-Neches Waterway in Texas before the shale-gas revolution, Golden Pass will be reconfigured to export up to 15.6 million tonnes per annum of LNG.

An engineering consortium comprising McDermott and Zachry Group of the US and Japan’s Chiyoda Corp. has been awarded the contract to build the plant.

The Qatar state energy company and ExxonMobil have also been running a joint marketing company called Ocean LNG, created in 2016.

Ocean LNG is responsible for placing all of the offtake from the Golden Pass liquefaction facility.

Following a final investment decision for Golden Pass made on the 5th of February 2019, the companies have been focusing on marketing US LNG volumes in the Asia-Pacific region.

ExxonMobil has been engaged in Vietnam offshore activities for several years, though progress has been slow.

Vietnam Oil and Gas Group (PetroVietnam) and Vietnam Exploration and Production Corp. (PVEP) are parties to a production-sharing agreement for offshore blocks 117-119.

However, no significant progress has been made since pre-front-end engineering and design was completed in 2018 on the Ca Voi Xanh field, also known as the Blue Whale field.

ExxonMobil has said that the Blue Whale field natural gas resources are large enough to provide power for a city the size of Hanoi for more than 20 years.