Cameron LNG is carrying out planned maintenance on one of three liquefaction trains at its 15mn t/yr (2bn ft³/d) export terminal in southwest Louisiana, a company spokesperson told Argus on Wednesday.
The company declined to comment on how long the maintenance is intended to last.
Feedgas nominations to Cameron LNG fell to 1.3bn ft³ on Wednesday from 1.4bn ft³ on Tuesday and an average of 1.9bn ft³/d over the previous 30 days, pipeline data show (see chart).
Cameron is the second US LNG export terminal to schedule maintenance during the September-October shoulder season. Berkshire Hathaway Energy's 5.75mn t/yr Cove Point LNG terminal in Maryland plans about two weeks of work beginning on 19 September. This comes with the LNG market constrained by the de facto closure of the strait of Hormuz, which has effectively shut in about 20pc of global supply since the US-Iran war began in late February.
But Cameron LNG said it does not anticipate any disruptions to its customers. France's TotalEnergies and Japanese trading firms Mitsubishi and Mitsui are Cameron LNG's offtakers, each with a 16.6pc stake in the project. Sempra Infrastructure holds the remaining 50.2pc stake and operates the terminal.
No ships were docked at Cameron LNG on Wednesday afternoon. But the Mitsui-operated 174,000m³ Marvel Phoenix departed with a 72,700t cargo earlier in the day, Kpler ship-tracking data show. The terminal has three LNG storage tanks, each with capacity of about 72,000t, giving Sempra Infrastructure flexibility to minimize loading disruptions during maintenance.
Cameron LNG most recently carried out maintenance on one of its trains throughout May, when feedgas flows averaged 1.5bn ft³/d. The terminal exported 870,000t of LNG that month, down from an average of 1.2mn t/month in the previous three months. The decline was equivalent to about 1.1 fewer cargoes per week, assuming a standard cargo size of 72,000.
Meanwhile, work on Cove Point LNG's pipeline system is expected to begin on 19 September, capping feedgas at 20mn ft³/d through 24 September and at 30mn ft³/d from 25 September to 2 October. The outage could remove another three cargoes from the market during that span.
