Tokyo Gas is in discussions with Venture Global to purchase 1 million metric tonnes per annum of liquefied natural gas from the company’s CP2 export facility, three people with knowledge of the talks told Reuters on Monday.
Venture Global is the second largest U.S. LNG exporter and since 2023 has been the main source of the country’s growing LNG export capacity, helping the U.S. remain the world’s largest exporter of the superchilled gas.
Tokyo Gas is negotiating the purchase of LNG from Venture Global on a 20-year contract, two of the three people told Reuters. The LNG is expected to come from the second phase of the CP2 export facility, which is scheduled to come online by the end of 2028, the three people said.
“We are exploring various projects, including those in the United States, to secure new LNG supplies, but we cannot comment on the status of individual projects,” Tokyo Gas told Reuters in a statement on Monday.
Venture Global was not immediately available for comment.
CP2 is expected to be the second largest LNG plant in the U.S., with a capacity to export 28 mtpa. When constructed, it will make Venture Global the largest U.S. LNG exporter.
Since April, Venture Global has signed 20-year sales and purchase agreements for the project with Petronas and Eni, and expanded its long-term sales deal with Germany’s SEFE.
The three new agreements bring the total contracted volume for CP2 up to 13.5 mtpa, CEO Mike Sabel told an earnings call earlier this month.
Venture Global has been offering LNG at prices lower than the market, two of the people said.
“They are putting pressure on the market because they are offering LNG at liquefaction fees of $2.35 per mmBtu (million British thermal unit) when some in the market are asking for between $2.50 and $2.75, making it hard to resist,” one of the three people told Reuters.
Venture Global is also offering uncommitted cargoes on short-term contracts from its Plaquemines export plant to potential CP2 buyers, allowing them to access LNG at an earlier date, a second person told Reuters.
Plaquemines, also in Louisiana, is Venture Global’s 27.2 mtpa LNG facility and is in its final stages of construction. It is the second-highest producing LNG facility in the U.S. behind Cheniere’s Sabine Pass export facility in Texas.
(Reporting by Curtis Williams in Houston, Marwa Rashat in London and Yuka Obayashi in Tokyo; Editing by Jan Harvey)