液化天然气出口国面临危机

据今日油价4月19日报道，2020年油价大幅下跌，全球经济受到侵害。美国能源信息署（EIA）预测，2020年，美国石油日产量很可能下降约50万桶，至1176万桶/天。美国不少中小型石油生产商正面临破产危机。与此同时，各大石油公司都在削减资本支出，并推迟重大项目投资。然而，不仅是石油生产国应该做好准备迎接挑战，液化天然气出口国也要做好直面危机的准备。

液化天然气需求受到全球需求骤减和油价暴跌的沉重打击，这在欧洲尤其严重。2020年3月，欧洲每月的液化天然气进口量创历史新高，1045万吨液化天然气运抵欧洲。随着价格跌至前所未有的低点，这种情况很大程度上是在意料之中的，尽管2019/2020年冬季比较暖和。

卡塔尔每月向亚洲液化天然气市场供应400万至500万吨液化天然气，但其核心出口市场的需求在未来几个月内都将出现萎缩。尽管所有欧洲主要经济体的液化天然气价格仍低于2美元/百万英热，但卡塔尔低廉的生产成本、庞大的资源基础以及较小的竞争压力，使其在欧洲的液化天然气市场中处于有利地位。许多分析师表示，欧洲天然气市场面临的首要难题是美国液化天然气(LNG)和俄罗的管道天然气的竞争，而如今竞争的范围呈指数级扩大。除了美国的液化天然气和俄罗斯天然气工业股份公司供应的管道天然气，卡塔尔还将以增加亚马尔液化天然气供应争夺市场份额。

今年3月，亚马尔向比利时泽布吕格液化天然气终端出口的液化天然气量达到历史最高水平，——这是俄罗斯液化天然气的主要中转站之一。尽管对欧洲和全球各大洲的天然气出口量并没有达到2019年12月的峰值水平，但有强烈迹象表明，诺瓦泰克及其亚马尔液化天然气合作伙伴已开始忽略利润，关注市场占有率。

所有国家在保持今年的经济正增长方面都遇到了巨大的困难，下面的说法可能听起来有点不合逻辑，但有一个强有力的反驳理由是，向欧洲输送的液化天然气不会随着石油需求的下降而急剧减少，因为，液化天然气的价格处于历史低位。卡塔尔显然关注到了这一点，并一直在积极明显地寻求英国、比荷卢(Benelux)和意大利市场，卡塔尔天然气公司在这些市场有长期承诺，同时一直避免向西班牙和其它国家供应现货。按照4月份的情况来看，美国的液化天然气供应量将较历史最高水平下降50%。

邹勤 摘译自 今日油价

原文如下：

Qatar And Russia Fight For LNG Supremacy As Prices Fall To Historic Lows

The 2020 drastic oil price drop, induced by the ever-frightening coronavirus and the Saudi-Russian spat, has ravaged business interests all across the world. US oil producers are facing a new reality – instead of a seemingly watertight growth trajectory, 2020 will most probably witness a decline in annual oil output by some 0.5mbpd, to the level of 11.76mbpd if one is to believe the last EIA forecast. Small and medium-sized US producers are bracing for a series of bankruptcies, the ones with more robust political connections are trying to salvage a deal that would provide some hope for a quick price hike, all the while the majors are cutting CAPEX and postponing major investments. Yet it is not only oil producers who should brace for a tiny revolution – LNG exporters will be the next in line, as can be judged from the current state of things in Europe.

The double whammy of oil prices plummeting and coronavirus diminishing LNG demand is still in its relative nascency in Europe. March 2020 has seen the highest-ever level of monthly LNG imports into Europe, with 10.45 million tons of LNG arriving across 170 cargoes. With prices dropping to unprecedented lows, this was very much to be expected, the warm winter of 2019/2020 notwithstanding. Then COVID-19 cut all the hype short. Chinese LNG demand is still moving back to the pre-COVID levels, India has declared a total lockdown, Japan has now declared a state of emergency until at least May 06 and South Korea already asking term LNG suppliers for delays on the back of missing demand – against such a background, the loss of the European market outlet ought to hurt.

Qatar, supplying the Asian LNG market with 4-5 million LNG tons per month, must confront demand faltering in its core export market for at least several months now. Despite landed LNG prices remaining lower than 2/MMbtu in all of Europe’s main economies, Qatar’s low production costs, massive resource base and lack of domestic competition place it in a favorable position when it comes to a LNG race to the bottom in Europe. For many analysts, the overarching dilemma of the European gas market was whether US LNG could prevail over Russian pipeline supplies, yet now the scope for competition expanded exponentially. Apart from US LNG and the Gazprom-supplied pipeline gas, Qatar will be also competing against Russian LNG in the form of increasing Yamal LNG supplies.

Yamal LNG exports to the Zeebrugge LNG terminal in Belgium have reached an all-time high in March 2020, one of the main transshipment points for Russian LNG, partially on the back of Zeebrugge commissioning a 5th storage tank for Russian volumes. Although not a peak export level per se, neither to Europe nor globally to all continents (both took place in December 2019), there is a strong indication that NOVATEK and its partners on Yamal LNG are starting to prioritize maintaining market share over increasingly slim profits. With the Chinese market – heretofore a significant pull factor for Yamal LNG volumes – all but non-existent for March and April-arriving cargoes, the battle for Europe seems to be intensifying.

The following might sound a bit illogical, given that Europe is currently in the throes of COVID-19 and countries across-the-board experience monumental difficulty in keeping this year’s economic growth numbers positive, yet there is a powerful counterargument for LNG deliveries to Europe not to decrease as steeply as oil demand decreased. That reason is the all-time low price of LNG. Qatar also understands this and has been palpably seeking to secure the UK, Benelux and Italian market where Qatargas has long-term commitments, all the while avoiding spot supplies to Spain and elsewhere. The simultaneous push of Qatar and Russia will leave very little space for American LNG – just as it reached a peak this February at 3.1 million LNG tons, if things stand as they are April deliveries will fall by 50% from that all-time high.