by Chen Aizhu and Marwa Rashad
SINGAPORE/LONDON (Reuters) – Russia’s top liquefied natural gas (LNG) producer Novatek has sent force majeure notifications to some of its customers over future LNG supplies from its Arctic LNG 2 project, four companies said on Thursday. industry sources to Reuters.
Novatek declined to immediately comment on the situation.
The notifications were issued after the United States last month imposed sanctions on the Arctic LNG 2 project, which is expected to start production before the end of this year or early 2024.
This project is a key element of Russia’s strategy on the global LNG market where it wants to increase its market share to a fifth by 2030 from around 8% currently.
The first LNG tankers associated with the project should set sail during the first quarter of 2024.
According to one of the sources, customers who had committed to purchasing the LNG, such as Chinese companies Shenergy Group and Zheijang Energy, as well as Spanish company Repsol, received force majeure notifications.
Repsol did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Shenergy Group and Zheijang Energy were not available for comment.
A force majeure may be declared when a supplier is unable to deliver to its customers due to circumstances beyond its control. In this case, he must inform the other party and provide him with an explanation.
(Reporting by Chen Aizhu and Marwa Rashad, with contributions from Emily Chow, Blandine Hénault for the , editing by Zhifan Liu)
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