Leading commodities firms and LNG traders tell conference that record year unlikely to be repeated soon
The world’s largest energy traders and liquefied natural gas portfolio holders, Trafigura, Vitol and Gunvor said their record year for revenues and profits in 2022 was unlikely to be repeated in the near future.
Tellurian boosted in development of Driftwood LNG project in Louisiana by Haynesville shale-gas income
Tellurian Inc., the developer of the Driftwood LNG export project in Louisiana, reported a rise in revenue from natural gas production because of increased prices and volumes from its Haynesville Shale assets as progress continued on construction preparations and LNG volume agreements.
The company generated $26M in revenues from natural gas sales, compared to $8.7M in the first quarter of 2021.
Tellurian said it ended the quarter with about $296M of cash and cash equivalents and $732M in total assets.
The Houston-based company also confirmed it had completed its site preparation and issued a limited notice to proceed to US LNG plant engineer Bechtel to begin construction of the Driftwood export facility.
“Tellurian’s own natural gas production and sales provide valuable operating cash and a unique advantage to us as a liquefied natural gas supplier,” said President and CEO Octávio Simões in the first-quarter 2022 earnings statement.
The Driftwood plant has permits to produce 27.6 million tonnes per annum of LNG and has 10-year offtake agreements with Shell North America and global commodities firms Vitol and Gunvor.
The Tellurian project involves constructing 20 mid-scale processing Trains, each with 1.38 MTPA of capacity, and built as five blocks of four Trains.
The Phase One development would include the first two of these blocks with 11 MTPA of output and two of three planned 235,000 cubic metres storage tanks and the first of three planned loading berths for LNG carriers.
Output
“We are nearing net production of 100 million cubic feet equivalent per day and plan to reach 200 mmcfe per day by year-end,” added Simões.
“Tellurian production is now generating free cash flow after capex and we intend to maintain capex at approximately $150M a year,” explained the CEO.
“With Bechtel now onsite beginning construction of Driftwood, we are on schedule to begin LNG production in 2026,” he stated.
Tellurian produced 6.1 billion cubic feet of natural gas for the quarter to the end of March compared with 4.9 Bcf for the previous
quarter.
Tellurian’s upstream assets include 13,521 net acres and interests in 82 producing wells as of March 2022.
