Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and the reduction in natural gas pipeline imports from Russia that followed, European countries have reactivated development of previously dormant regasification projects and have started development of new projects.

China and India now purchase two-thirds of all the crude exported by sea from Russia; at least half of the crude exported by pipeline from Russia also goes to China.

The 2023 contractual expiries represent roughly 8% of Japan's annual LNG imports of around 74 million mt, a level that will likely be difficult to replace with incremental supply from other long-term term contracts and short-to-mid-term contracts amid tight LNG markets.

Egypt has two LNG export facilities -- the 7.2 million mt/year Shell-operated Idku facility and the smaller Eni-operated 5 million mt/year Damietta plant.

Failure to reach a deal would send a signal that the EU’s united response to the war-driven energy crisis is falling apart -- a political gift for Moscow that Europe is keen to avoid.

U.S. commercial crude oil inventories decreased by 3.7 million barrels to 431.7 million barrels.

Exceptionally mild weather across Northwest Europe since October has led to a sharp drop in gas prices from record levels over the summer.

This agreement is the second LNG SPA between QatarEnergy and Sinopec, following the 10-year SPA signed in March 2021 for the supply of 2 Mt/year (2.8 bcm/year) to China.

Independent estimates indicate that the U.S. needs to expand electricity transmission systems by 60% by 2030 and may need to triple current capacity by 2050 to accommodate the country’s rapidly increasing supply of cheaper, cleaner energy and meet increasing power demand for electric vehicles and electric home heating and reduce power outages from severe weather.

Meanwhile, the European Union is continuing talks about ways to limit spikes in gas prices ahead of a meeting of energy ministers next week.

U.S. commercial crude oil inventories decreased by 5.4 million barrels to 435.4 million barrels.

Benchmark gas futures settled 9.2% higher, following an increase of 16% on Monday. Freeport LNG in Texas will likely extend an outage that began in June, increasing global competition for much-needed supplies right before the winter.

According to preliminary data, Gazprom produced 359.7 billion cubic meters of gas from January 1 through November 15, 2022. This is a decrease of 19.2 per cent (or 85.3 billion cubic meters) versus the same period of last year.

The Netherlands, Poland, Spain, France and Italy have been the top five destinations for Saudi oil in the region this year, all of which have also been regular buyers of Russian crude.

Gas prices soared this year tracking the Russia-Ukraine war. But even if there was some peace settlement or an agreement with Ukraine, non-Russian gas will likely continue to attract a premium