The consortium is comprised of three of the leading gas utilities in Japan and Mitsubishi Corporation which have been conducting preliminary feasibility work on the project since 2022. With the addition of Sempra Infrastructure, the companies seek to advance the energy transition through the global market of liquified e-natural gas.
“Sempra Infrastructure is excited to bring its essential infrastructure develop-ment experience to this collaboration with Tokyo Gas, Osaka Gas, Toho Gas and Mitsubishi Corporation. The project would allow existing natural gas infrastructure, including the global LNG supply chain and the gas distribution systems in nations across the world, to be used as the backbone for the delivery of a long-term, car-bon-neutral fuel,” said Justin Bird, CEO of Sempra Infrastructure. “Sempra Infrastruc-ture has strong strategic alignment with the goals of the consortium and is well-positioned to support this innovative opportunity by building on what we do well: developing energy infrastructure that provides access to safe, secure, affordable and lower and zero-carbon energy for our global partners.”
“Tokyo Gas, Osaka Gas, Toho Gas, and Mitsubishi Corporation intend to real-ise the world’s first large-scale production and international supply chain of e-natural gas and have been progressing feasibility work. The U.S. Gulf Coast is an ideal location for this type of facility and we are pleased to partner with Sempra In-frastructure, a company with a reliable and qualified track-record of developing energy infrastructure in this region. We look forward to the development of this pro-ject as a truly global consortium,” added Kentaro Kimoto, Representative Executive Officer of Tokyo Gas, Keiji Takemori, Senior Executive Officer of Osaka Gas, Takeo Haigo, Managing Executive Officer of Toho Gas, and Masaru Saito, Executive Vice President of Mitsubishi Corporation.
The proposed project is anticipated to produce 130 000 t of e-natural gas per year that would be liquified to become liquified e-natural gas via Mitsubishi Corpo-ration’s tolling capacity at the Cameron LNG terminal in Southwest Louisiana and exported to Japan, where the product is commonly referred to as e-methane or Bio-LNG. The proposed project is anticipated to include the production or procurement of green hydrogen, as well as the construction of facilities to produce the e-natural gas.
The US Department of Energy and Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and In-dustry are currently implementing a Memorandum of Cooperation in the field of car-bon capture, utilisation and storage, conversion and recycling, and CO2 removal. This proposed project would meet many of the objectives in the memorandum, and could complement it, should the policy frameworks recognise e-natural gas as a carbon-neutral fuel.
Successful development of the proposed project is contingent upon complet-ing the required commercial agreements, securing and/or maintaining all necessary permits, obtaining financing, and reaching a final investment decision, among other factors and considerations.
