RWE Supply & Trading and Sempra Infrastructure have signed a Heads of Agreement (HoA) on supplying the portfolio of the European Utility RWE with Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) from the Port Arthur LNG project in Texas, US. The terms contemplate negotiations and finalisation of a definitive 15-year supply and purchase contract for approximately 2.25 million tonnes per year of LNG. The volumes will be delivered at the US coast and can be shipped by RWE to any location in the world – as an example to the planned LNG import facilities in Germany.
Andree Stracke, CEO of RWE Supply & Trading: “As RWE, we are very pleased to join forces with Sempra Infrastructure, one of the leading companies for LNG infrastructure in the US. This partnership will contribute to diversifying the portfolio of gas supply of RWE and Germany and thus enhancing security of supply in Europe on a long-term basis.”
Justin Bird, CEO of Sempra Infrastructure: “We are excited about the opportunity to work with one of Germany’s leading power producers to help support energy security in the region and accelerate the transition to lower-carbon energy supplies.”
Sempra Infrastructure is a US-based infrastructure company that develop, build and operate LNG facilities and LNG development projects on the Gulf Coast of North America and Pacific Coast of Mexico. The Port Arthur LNG Phase 1 project is a fully-permitted development project in Jefferson county, Texas, aiming at increasing the capacities for LNG production in the US whilst lowering greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions across the LNG value chain through the use of new technologies and the improvement of key processes.
The envisaged partnership with Sempra Infrastructure underlines RWE’s role as a major importer of energy in the coming years, helping to achieve independency of fuel supplies from Russia. Germany will become an important market for LNG, purchased from different regions of the world to diversify Germany’s supply sources. Besides the US, Qatar and Australia are key countries for LNG production and supply.
RWE is also committed to prepare for the import of green molecules in the future to support the achievement of the climate protection targets in the EU. For this reason, the company is working on realising a terminal for the import of green ammonia in the immediate vicinity of the LNG terminal in Brunsbüttel. The project is intended to help facilitate the subsequent conversion of the entire site ready to import green molecules. The partnership with Sempra Infrastructure also provides for a framework to work on reduction, mitigation, and reporting of GHG emissions associated with deliveries of LNG from the Port Arthur LNG project and inclusion of responsibly sourced gas as part of the project’s feed gas supply, and can therefore build the basis for supplying low carbon gas in the future. Through this partnership, Sempra Infrastructure and RWE intend to discuss extending cooperation across the energy transition, including hydrogen and renewables.