Trade war seen threatening next US LNG export wave
The China sanctions syndrome could turn out to be a double blessing in disguise. Firstly, US terminal project builders will look for ways to drive down costs (and they will find them) making their project ever more competitive in a crazy world. When their price cannot be matched by most other new projects anymore, China won’t matter. But way more important, the rising price for diesel and much lower LNG prices will fuel a second LNGificaton wave in North America. This time, a big swathe of the transport industry is going to switch over to LNG and so US liquefiers might even find that their product sells better in the US than abroad.
If trade negotiations between the US and China fail, American natural gas exporters could find themselves shipping fewer cargoes to a key market and watching a second wave of US gas liquefaction terminals suffer delay, analysts caution.
