The hottest natural gas export in the United State

U.S. natural gas exports are difficult to make up for Europe's energy weakness

U.S. natural gas exports are difficult to make up for Europe's energy weakness

March 20, 2014

[China paint information] the continuous fermenting crisis in Ukraine has once again exposed the "weakness" of Europe's excessive dependence on Russia for energy. Recently, many European officials and U.S. lawmakers have called on the United States to increase natural gas exports to Europe to weaken Russia's influence in the European energy market. However, the approval process of natural gas exports in the United States is slow, and the paper of Erb and his team on building exports was published in the first issue of nature communications on October 23. The terminal takes a long time. In the short term, the total amount of natural gas exports in the United States will be far lower than Europe's imports from Russia, which cannot change the current energy supply pattern in Europe

energy security has always been an important weakness restricting the economic development of Europe. Due to the relative lack of traditional energy such as oil and natural gas, Europe is not only highly dependent on energy imports, but also has a single import channel, which has been subject to Russia's oil and gas supply for a long time. Take natural gas as an example. Last year, Europe consumed about 534.3 billion cubic meters of natural gas, of which about 30% was imported from Russia, and most of it was transported through Ukrainian pipelines

in recent years, due to disputes between Russia and Ukraine over natural gas supply prices, transit costs and debt repayment, Russia has repeatedly stopped natural gas supply to Ukraine, and other European countries have also suffered from "gas cut-off". Recently, the continuous tension in Ukraine has made European countries once again worried about the possible impact on natural gas supply, and deeply realized the importance and urgency of promoting the diversification of energy supply and getting rid of dependence on Russia. According to the media, one of the main topics of the EU summit to be held on the 20th is to reduce the heavy dependence on Russian energy. At present, Lithuania, the Czech Republic, Bulgaria and other countries have imported more than 80% of their natural gas from Russia

with the sharp increase in domestic oil and gas production brought about by the shale gas revolution in the United States, the United States has surpassed Russia to become the world's largest natural gas producer. According to the prediction of the US energy information administration, the US natural gas production will maintain a steady growth in the next 30 years, and the United States will become a net exporter of natural gas by 2018

however, as Europe and the United States have not signed a free trade agreement, Europe's natural gas imports from the United States are first faced with the restrictions of U.S. law. According to U.S. law, enterprises will 1. Instrument and equipment managers must be familiar with the performance and operating procedures of the instruments and equipment under their control. The export of domestic natural gas to countries that have not signed a trade agreement with the United States must be in the public interest of the United States and submitted to the Department of energy for approval. Judging from the experience of the past few years, the process of the U.S. government approving natural gas exports is very slow. Statistics from the U.S. Department of energy station show that since 2011, only 6 LNG Export projects have been approved for export to countries that have not signed trade agreements with the United States, and 24 similar applications are pending approval. The six projects that have been approved can export about 243million cubic meters of natural gas every day, while Europe imported 457million cubic meters of natural gas from Russia on average last year

during the fourth round of negotiations on the transatlantic trade and investment partnership agreement between the United States and Europe, which ended a few days ago, the European Union hoped to break through this legal restriction and proposed to include the provisions to ensure the import of natural gas from the United States into the negotiation agreement, but the United States did not accept it. Dann Manila, the representative of the Henan union group, said that the U.S. - European free trade negotiations provided an opportunity for energy trade liberalization, but whether it could be achieved depended on private participants and international pricing

in fact, to meet the performance requirements of automotive plastic parts; Since the construction of liquefaction devices and natural gas export terminals requires the approval of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission of the United States, and requires a lot of money and several years, even if the U.S. government quickly approves the natural gas export application project, it will not be able to supply gas to Europe in the short term. Among the six LNG Export projects approved in the United States at present, only the Sabine pass project in Louisiana is approved to start construction, and the natural gas export will not be realized until the second half of 2015 at the earliest

more importantly, because the import price of natural gas in Asia is higher than that in Europe, the export of natural gas from the United States to Asia is more profitable. Many oil and gas enterprises in the United States have signed long-term natural gas supply contracts with South Korea, Japan, Indonesia and other Asian countries. Industry insiders estimate that if the natural gas import quotation of European countries exceeds that of Asian countries, the cost will be 60% higher than that of importing from Russia, which is unbearable for countries such as Ukraine

therefore, the natural gas export of the United States is still "far from hydrolysis and near thirst" for Europe, which is difficult to get rid of its energy dependence on Russia in the short term. However, the Ukrainian crisis does promote the debate on natural gas exports in the United States from the previous macroeconomic impact to geopolitical and strategic interests, which may bring variables to the evolution of the global energy pattern in the future