Inpex to sign more LNG customers

Japan’s Inpex is expected to rope in more customers for its Ichthys liquefied natural gas project (LNG) before a final decision about the development of the project is made.

Japan's Chubu Electric and Toho Gas, and Taiwan's CPC Corporation have already agreed to take half of daily LNG production volumes from Ichthys and the company was in negotiations with five major Japanese utilities to sell the remaining volumes and expected to have the new contracts in place by the time a final investment decision was made.

Japanese government has a 18 percent stake and the project is the first LNG project operated by Inpex.

Gas from the project will be processed in Darwin, involving the construction of one of the world's longest subsea pipelines at almost 900 km in length.

However, the cost of the project is expected to go up to $30 billion against Inpex's estimate of $20 billion.