USA: Henry Hub price up, Sabine Pass exports cargo

Natural gas spot prices in the United States increased almost everywhere in the week ending October 12 with the Henry Hub price rising 31¢ from last Wednesday, according to the weekly report by the Energy Information Administration.

“Despite the high levels of natural gas storage stocks, prices seem to be elevated on increasing demand, which may be related to a cold front moving south across the Canadian border, as well as to overall higher levels of electric-sector demand for natural gas this year,” the EIA said in its report.

The Henry Hub spot price rose from $2.86/million British thermal units (MMBtu) last Wednesday to $3.17/MMBtu two days ago.

At the Nymex, the price of the November 2016 contract increased 17¢, from $3.041/MMBtu last Wednesday to $3.210/MMBtu this Wednesday. Similarly, the price of the 12-month strip, averaging November 2016 through October 2017 futures contracts, climbed 13¢ to $3.312/MMBtu, the EIA said.

According to data from PointLogic, the average total supply of natural gas remained the same as the previous week. Dry natural gas production levels were constant week over week, whereas net imports from Canada decreased by 1% from last week.

Sabine Pass exports another cargo during maintenance

There were no pipeline deliveries to Cheniere’s Sabine Pass liquefaction terminal as the plant is currently in the third week of a four-week planned maintenance of Trains 1 and 2.

However, the facility continued to ship cargoes as the storage tanks were full prior going into this maintenance.

One vessel with LNG-carrying capacity of 3 Bcf left the terminal on October 9, the EIA said in the report.

The vessel in question is the 130,000-cbm Bilbao Knutsen LNG tanker, chartered by Hague-based LNG giant Shell that has export rights at the Sabine Pass export plant.

However, this not the first tanker to leave the facility during the maintenance period as another Shell-chartered LNG tanker left the facility on September 24.

The 161,870-cbm Maran Gas Sparta delivered the Sabine Pass cargo to Mexico’s Manzanillo LNG terminal last week, according to AIS data provided by the vessel tracking website, MarineTraffic.

The Sabine Pass liquefaction facility, first of its kind to export U.S. shale gas, started shipping the chilled fuel from Train 1 in February this year.

Cheniere is developing and constructing up to six liquefaction trains at Sabine Pass, each with a nominal production capacity of approximately 4.5 million tons per annum of LNG.

Trains 1 and 2 at the LNG export plant have achieved substantial completion in May and September, respectfully, while Train 3 is undergoing commissioning. Trains 4 and 5 are under construction, and Train 6 is fully permitted.

LNG World News Staff