Geopolitics is taking a hand in causing serious shortages of natural gas in Europe.
European nations who have taken a hard stance against Russia are falling victim to a cut off of gas when it’s most needed, during the cold winter months.
Into the breach is the United States ready to spool up its oil and gas production meet the demand.
Dr. Gregory Upton with the LSU Center for Energy says the industry was already working to bring more jobs and product to market before the crisis began.
“Our forecasts suggest that between now and mid-year, we will gain about 3500 jobs in the oil and gas extraction sector here in Louisiana,” Upton says.
Upton is confident the region will be openly supplying Europe with liquefied natural gas.
“There’s definitely going to be more LNG export coming over the next year.”
Already the first LNG tanker from the U.S. has arrived in Germany to replace what was lost when the Nord Stream pipeline was sabotaged prompting Ukraine and Poland to point the finger at Russia.
Meanwhile, three LNG production facilities are under construction in Louisiana and Texas.
“We’re forecast at least 1500 jobs will be gained in the refining, chemical manufacturing and export part of this sector and that will include LNG export.”
One of those facilities is in Plaquemines Parish with Venture Global’s Plaquemines LNG terminal which will have a capacity to move 20 million tons of LNG per year.
Of course, new terminals for import and export are coming on line in Lake Charles.
Despite all the good news about demand, Upton says making natural gas is still a challenge to produce:
“LNG is expensive, it’s expensive to liquefy, its very energy intensive to liquefy, and it’s expensive to ship across the world. But there’s some benefit to having some small share of the world natural gas trade that’s very, very flexible.”
But in the end, Upton says as demand rises across the world for clean burning natural gas… “We will likely see more LNG export built here in Louisiana and more export appear over the coming years because of that geopolitical situation.”
