RIYADH: Saudi Aramco will sign on Tuesday memoranda of understanding with US liquefied natural gas producer NextDecade and utility firm Sempra , Aramco’s chief executive said, as the oil giant expands in the LNG market.
“The US today, in terms of gas, is almost 100 billion (dollars) in sales ... and it is continuously increasing,” Aramco’s CEO Amin Nasser told the US-Saudi Investment Forum in Riyadh.
“The US is really a good place to put our investment,” he added, noting that under the MoUs Sempra and NextDecade would supply around 6.2 million tonnes of LNG to Aramco.
The US is already the world’s largest exporter of LNG and producers have plans in place that would double capacity in coming years.
NextDecade last month signed a deal with a subsidiary of Aramco, which is seeking to become a big player in the LNG market, under which the US firm will supply the superchilled gas from its Rio Grande facility for 20 years.
“We do have other investments. So we’re looking at, by 2030, almost seven and a half million tons of LNG,” Nasser noted, speaking of expansion plans.
Nasser also said that one of the investments that Aramco plans to sign on Tuesday involved an expansion of the Motiva Port Arthur’s refinery in the US, noting the oil giant would invest $3.4 billion in the refinery.
