Colombia LNG expansion tender draws 10 bids

Ten companies have expressed interest in a bidding process for new LNG regasification capacity in Colombia amid efforts to avert a looming gas shortage, state-run oil company Ecopetrol said on Thursday. 

The announcement came as the Bogotá-based company forecast a gas deficit of 83BBTU/d (billion British thermal units) in 2025. 

"In the first week of July the period to submit offers will end," Ecopetrol said in a statement. 

"It is hoped that in the second half of 2024 the contracting of services associated with the regasification of LNG will move forward." 

Colombia currently has regasification capacity of 400Mf3/d (million cubic feet a day) via its only functioning LNG import facility in Cartagena. 

In its latest 15-year gas supply plan published in February, energy ministry planning unit UPME raised the prospect of expanding LNG capacity on the northern Atlantic coast or at the Pacific port of Buenaventura in the country's west. 

Ecopetrol said it was also pushing ahead with plans to import gas from Venezuela and accelerate production from offshore areas in the Caribbean Sea. 

Speaking at the Andesco energy conference in Cartagena, Ecopetrol CEO Ricardo Roa insisted the company was capable of guaranteeing gas supply in the short and medium term if the right conditions were in place. 

"To achieve this objective we urgently require regulatory flexibility for the commercialization of gas, the fast-tracking of permitting and the approval of a special license from the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to import Venezuelan gas," Roa said. 

He added that the company was also awaiting the lifting of restrictions related to gas transport infrastructure.