Page 8 - GLNG Week 50 2021

GLNG AMERICAS GLNG

YPF exec says Argentina is

studying LNG export plans

POLICY ARGENTINA’S national oil company (NOC), Buenos Aires were willing to be patient. “With
YPF, is reportedly looking into proposals for the current macroeconomic environment in
establishing LNG export capacity in the expecta- Argentina, any multi-billion-dollar and mul-
tion that production levels will rise at fields in the ti-year project such as an LNG terminal should
Vaca Muerta shale formation and new pipelines probably take a few years to come. But the One of the
will be built to move production to the Atlantic opportunity is there,” he commented.
coast. One of the opportunities YPF wants to explore opportunities
Alejandro Lew, the CFO of YPF, said last is rooted in the seasonal differences between the
week that the state-owned company had begun Northern and Southern Hemispheres, he added. YPF wants to
carrying out preliminary studies so that it could Gas demand is lowest in Argentina when it is
take the steps needed to turn the country into highest in large markets such as North America explore is rooted
a net exporter of natural gas. “We are doing the and Europe, he explained. Exporting surplus gas in the seasonal
technical studies to be prepared,” he said during to the Northern Hemisphere is sure to become
a speech at the Americas Society and Council of easier by the winter of 2023, when a large new differences
the Americas energy conference on December pipeline capable of handling 44mn cubic metres
10. per day of gas is due to be completed, he added. between the
Lew stressed that these studies were still in YPF made its first attempt to export LNG in
the early stages, since Buenos Aires did not have the summer of 2019/2020, when it hired a float- Northern and
many options for securing the many billions ing LNG (FLNG) vessel from the US-based firm Southern
of dollars in financing that will be necessary Excelerate Energy for the purpose of exporting
to build networks of new LNG terminals and cargoes to Asia. The scheme was suspended in Hemispheres.
export-oriented pipelines. YPF, as a state-owned 2020, when gas production, prices and demand
company, is not in a position to access world cap- all plummeted as a consequence of the coronavi-
ital markets at reasonable rates given that Argen- rus (COVID-19) pandemic. Prices and demand
tina has been mired in a financial crisis for the have since recovered, though, and output levels
last four years, he noted. are also on the way up in many production prov-
He also indicated, though, that officials in inces, including Vaca Muerta.™

P8 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 50 17•December•2021