quote:

US energy department rebrands fossil fuels as 'molecules of freedom'
Press release from department said increasing export capacity is ‘critical to spreading freedom gas throughout the world’

America is the land of freedom, as any politician will be happy to tell you. What you don’t hear quite so often is that the stuff under the land is also apparently made of freedom as well. That is, at least according to a news release this week from the Department of Energy (DoE).

Mark W Menezes, the US undersecretary of energy, bestowed a peculiar honorific on our continent’s natural resources, dubbing it “freedom gas” in a release touting the DoE’s approval of increased exports of natural gas produced by a Freeport LNG terminal off the coast of Texas.

“Increasing export capacity from the Freeport LNG project is critical to spreading freedom gas throughout the world by giving America’s allies a diverse and affordable source of clean energy,” he said.

actual Trump admin quote: "Increasing export capacity from the Freeport [liquid natural gas] project is critical to spreading freedom gas" https://slate.com/business/201...tment-of-energy.html …

The concept of “freedom gas” may seem amorphous, but it’s actually being measured down to the smallest unit.

“With the US in another year of record-setting natural gas production, I am pleased that the Department of Energy is doing what it can to promote an efficient regulatory system that allows for molecules of US freedom to be exported to the world,” said Steven Winberg.

It’s unclear if members of the Trump administration attempting to assign patriotic intentions to natural gas are aware of the silliness of the concept, but Rick Perry seems to believe in it.

“Seventy-five years after liberating Europe from Nazi Germany occupation, the United States is again delivering a form of freedom to the European continent,” the energy secretary said earlier this month, according to EURACTV.

“And rather than in the form of young American soldiers, it’s in the form of liquefied natural gas.”

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US LNG imports in EU: Markets will decide

November 28, 2018

Markets, more than politics, are the driving forces behind boosting imports of American liquefied natural gas in the European Union. Despite President Juncker’s promise to increase these imports, Brussels’s room for manoeuvre is extremely limited.

After meeting in the White House in Washington last July, European Commission President Juncker and US President Trump agreed, in a joint statement, to work on several tracks to strengthen the trade relationship. One of them is to reinforce their strategic cooperation on energy.

Juncker said that the EU was ready to facilitate more imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the US. “The growing exports of US liquefied natural gas, if priced competitively, could play an increasing and strategic role in EU gas supply,” Juncker said.

But the Commission’s room for manoeuvre is narrow when it comes to boost LNG imports, says Marco Giuli, a policy analyst at the Brussels based European Policy Centre (epc).

“There has been quite a lot of hype, but actually there was no deal in which Juncker accepted to import American gas, simply because the European Commission does not have this power, it does not sign gas deals.”

[...]

75 percent of LNG import capacity unused

But whether American gas will eventually be sold to Europe depends on the gas market, says Luca Franza, a researcher from the Clingendael International Energy Programme.

So far, Europe has been a residual market for LNG, getting the gas that is unsolicited by other markets, notably in Asia, where countries are usually ready to pay higher LNG prices. This means than an increase in US LNG imports into the EU could be driven two factors, namely a global LNG glut, or some seasonal sales to the EU, i.e. whenever Asian gas demand is lower in that period, explains Franza.

“Europe does not really need to do much more to be open to receive LNG, and the reason is that it already is. So, three quarters of European LNG import capacity is currently unutilised, so it does not make much sense to add further regasification terminals. Promising new energy terminals can be in part a political move by some European countries like Germany, for instance, to appease US opposition to NS2 [Nord Stream 2], that’s how I would read it.”

In the end, it is the market that will decide.

“Politicians cannot really decide where LNG will be sold ultimately. Because American LNG is part of the portfolio of private companies, or by companies that are driven by commercial considerations, so these companies will sell to the highest paying customers. Then some countries, especially in Eastern Europe, might be willing to pay a political premium for energy supplies to diversify away from Russia, but this is more the exception than the rule.”

[...]