QatarEnergy Extends Force Majeure on Edison LNG to End-December
The Italian buyer, an EDF unit, faces a further three cargoes held back as repairs at Ras Laffan stretch over years.
QatarEnergy has extended the suspension of its liquefied natural gas deliveries to Italy's Edison through the end of December, adding three more cargoes to a halt that had been set to lapse in early December.
Edison received a fresh force majeure notice covering volumes due at Italy's Adriatic LNG terminal until the end of the year, and the extension was logged on the platform run by Italy's energy markets manager.
A 25-year contract signed in 2009 commits QatarEnergy to 6.4 billion cubic metres a year, about a tenth of Italy's gas consumption. Edison, a unit of France's EDF, is among Qatar's largest European customers.
QatarEnergy declared force majeure on several long-term contracts on March 24, affecting customers in Italy, Belgium, South Korea and China. Iranian attacks during the US-Israeli war on Iran were reported to have damaged two of Qatar's 14 LNG trains and one of two gas-to-liquids plants at Ras Laffan. Its chief executive said repairs would take three to five years and cut about 12.8 million tonnes of annual LNG production.
Some Qatari volumes are moving again. Poland's Orlen is due to take its first QatarEnergy cargo since its contract was suspended, with the tanker Al Kharsaah expected at the Swinoujscie terminal on November 14, according to shipping data and two people familiar with the matter. Orlen declined to comment. The force majeure remains in place, one source said.
For Italy, the Edison deal is one of the largest single supply lines into the market, and repairs measured in years mean the volumes cannot be restored by a scheduling change. Replacement cargoes must come from the spot market, where competition for flexible supply is fiercest in winter.
