Galveston Bay LNG Terminal

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Galveston Bay LNG Terminal was a proposed LNG terminal in Louisiana, United States. It was cancelled by NextDecade in January 2021.

Location

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Project Details

• Owner: Galveston Bay LNG
• Parent: NextDecade
• Location: Texas City, Texas, United States
• Coordinates: 29.370473, -94.893210 (approximate)
• Capacity: 16.5 million tonnes per annum (3 trains, 5.5 MTPA each)
• Status: Cancelled
• Type: Export
• Start Year: 2027

Note: mtpa = million tonnes per year; bcfd = billion cubic feet per day

Background

Galveston Bay LNG, a unit of the US LNG export project developer NextDecade, has been granted a 20-year permit by the Department of Energy to export liquefied natural gas. The company filed an application on December 22, 2017, seeking permit to export LNG in a volume equivalent to 785.7 billion cubic feet per year of natural gas from its proposed facility in Texas City to free trade agreement (FTA) and non-FTA countries, although the DoE noted it will review the non-FTA portion of the application separately. Galveston Bay LNG states that the project will include natural gas treatment, compression, liquefaction and storage facilities, as well as ancillary facilities required to receive and liquefy natural gas, and to store, load, and export LNG. The company further states that its parent company, NextDecade, has entered into a three-year lease for the site known as Shoal Point, with the northern and western perimeters of the site located adjacent to the Texas City ship channel, from two landholders, the Texas General Land Office and the City of Texas City, Texas. The project will consist of both land-based and marine components, the DoE notice says. It will include four LNG storage tanks, each with a storage capacity of approximately 200,000 cubic meters, three LNG trains, and truck and marine vessel loading facilities. Each of the LNG trains will be capable of producing up to approximately 5.5 million tons per annum (mtpa) of LNG, for a total capacity of 16.5 mtpa of LNG. According to Galveston Bay LNG, the project will be capable of processing an average of approximately 785.7 Bcf/yr of pipeline quality natural gas, which is the volume requested to be cleared for export. To date, the project, that will be supplied by an approximately 85-mile long pipeline, to be developed by a Galveston Bay LNG affiliate, and run to the Katy Gas Market Hub, has not entered into contracts for the proposed exports. However, it stated that it will file all the long-term and binding deals once they are executed.

Construction had been expected to start in 2022, with operations to be initiated in 2027.

In January 2021, NextDecade announced that the site of the proposed terminal was not suitable for development and it was therefore cancelling the project. In a statement, the company said that the US Army Corps of Engineers had advised that part of the Galveston Bay LNG site fell under a special navigation designation that would have required a request for the U.S. Congress to remove the designation, and thus the prospect of prolonged uncertainty in the decision-making had necessitated its decision.