France’s Total in Papua LNG deal with PNG’s Kumul

French energy giant Total and Papua New Guinea’s Kumul Petroleum recently signed a binding heads of agreement to jointly market their shares of production from the proposed Papua LNG export project.

Under the deal, the duo will negotiate a shareholders’ agreement for an incorporated joint venture to be set up as the corporate vehicle to commercialize their combined production share of LNG and condensates from Papua LNG, according to a joint statement.

The JV will engage potential buyers of LNG in the Asia Pacific region for the long-term sale and purchase of their respective entitlements of LNG in the export project, the statement said.

Papua LNG is a proposed liquefaction and export facility to be located some 25 kilometres north of Port Moresby, the capital of Papua New Guinea.

The plant would be supplied from the Total-operated Elk and Antelope gas/condensate fields.

Papua New Guinea already exports the chilled fuel via the ExxonMobil-operated PNG LNG plant near Port Moresby.