US Senator Calls on France to Allow Gas Deal
US senator Kevin Cramer of North Dakota has called on France to stop preventing a US LNG deal over what he said were "misplaced" environmental concerns.
Various media outlets reported in October that the French government had asked energy group Engie to delay signing a 20-year deal worth $7bn to buy LNG from NextDecade's Rio Grande project in Texas, because of the emissions created by US gas. The government is a shareholder in Engie.
"If the reports are true, the intervention could have negative implications for the future of trade between our two great countries," Cramer said in a letter to French president Emmanuel Macron that was shared on the Republican senator's website.
"The US has the ability to provide France with access to the cleanest and most efficient source of natural gas in the world," he continued "Importing more US LNG strengthens the US-France trade relationship and provides France significant environmental and geopolitical benefits."
US LNG is the best choice in terms of emissions, reliability and security, he said. "I hope the French government will reconsider its decision to intervene in this matter and recognise the US and France can together embrace a shared energy future that is, through natural gas, based on energy security, reliability, and lowering emissions globally."
A similar letter was led in the House of Representatives by Republican representatives Dan Crenshaw of Texas and Garret Graves of Louisiana. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was understood to be planning to lead a diplomatic push to ensure that the deal went ahead.
Cramer noted that the EU bought significant volumes of LNG from Russia, and that a US energy department lab found in 2019 that US LNG had 41% less lifecycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. If Europe replaced all its Russian LNG with US LNG, the associated emissions would fell by 72mn metric tons annually, he said.
Russia's Gazprom estimated earlier this year that its piped gas to Europe via the Nord Stream and TurkStream pipelines generated less than three times as much GHG emissions than US LNG.