LNG Projects Attract Billions of Dollars via Long-Term Contracts

The world’s largest project financing deals have been transacted in the LNG sector for liquefaction schemes. We look at financing trends in LNG versus the wider project finance market and examine why LNG has continued to compete successfully with other industries for global funds. But can the sector continue to lure global funding? It is timely to examine this success as LNG moves from two bumper years – liquefaction projects raised around $37 billion in debt in 2014 and 2015 – to times of crude pricing uncertainty. LNG project financing has grown rapidly since it was first used in 1980 for Woodside’s North West Shelf in Australia. At the time, the $1.4-billion deal was described as the world’s largest financing done on a limited-recourse basis to the sponsor. Fast forward and this deal pales next to recent LNG mega-project financings. Accounting for inflation would put North West Shelf’s financing at roughly $3.6 billion in today’s money. Even so, it wouldn’t even be on to the list of the top 10 liquefaction project financings of the last decade. It would come in at number 15. Please fill out form below to view article.