LNG REGASIFICATION TERMINALS ACCESS CAPACITY ANALYSIS FOR SECURITY OF EUROPEAN NATURAL GAS SUPPLY

Abstract

Increasing natural gas consumption, declining North Sea gas reserves, increased production costs and the deregulation of European gas and electricity markets have all combined to create new opportunities for LNG in Europe. In these circumstances, LNG represents an opportunity for many European countries to diversify their natural gas supply, while decreasing their dependence on Russian natural gas import at the same time. The largest exporters of LNG to Europe are Qatar, Algeria, Nigeria, Trinidad & Tobago, Egypt and Oman. Spain, Great Britain and France are the largest European importers of LNG. Spain has six LNG regasification terminals, followed by four in Great Britain, three in France, two in Italy and Turkey and finally Greece and Portugal with one terminal each. New LNG regasification terminals are currently under construction in Italy, Spain, Sweden and Netherlands. In addition, more than 30 new LNG terminal projects have been proposed around Europe. Italy plans to construct as many as 10 new regasification terminals, due to the strong orientation of its national energy policy towards LNG. Many European countries are strongly considering participating in the LNG chain for the first time, namely Albania, Cyprus, Ireland, Lithuania, Germany, Poland, Romania, Ukraine and Croatia. This paper focuses on a specific aspect of the LNG supply chain: the import facility (the paper is published in Croatian).

Keywords

• LNG regasification terminals
• terminal capacity
• natural gas consumption