Uniper Initials LNG Deal with Woodside

Australia's Woodside said September 20 has indicated it is looking to supply LNG to Germany’s Uniper.

Woodside Energy Trading Singapore announced it has signed a Heads of Agreement (HOA) with Uniper Global Commodities for the supply of up to 0.6mn mt/yr for four years starting 2019. The agreement still needs to be firmed up into a fully termed LNG sales and purchase agreement.

Woodside CEO Peter Coleman said that the LNG would be supplied from the company’s portfolio sources to markets in Europe and Asia and illustrated “further diversification of Woodside’s buyer relationships and the increasing interaction between participants in the Asia-Pacific and Atlantic LNG markets as international trading patterns become more liquid.” A year ago Woodside signed a firm deal to supply 12 LNG cargoes to rival German company RWE between April 2018 and March 2020.

Uniper group chief operating officer Keith Martin said that the HOA represents "another step for Uniper in establishing long-term partnerships globally and demonstrates our ambitions to further grow Uniper’s Asian portfolio whilst leveraging our midstream assets in Europe.”  The company largely sources piped gas for its European operations, but has inked a small firm deal with US supplier Freeport LNG - start of which was delayed nine months until September 2019 - and a much larger one with a Canadian export project that has yet to take a final investment decision. 

Finnish utility Fortum earlier this year failed to secure majority control of Uniper but remains its largest shareholder with 47.35% equity.

Uniper acknowledged mid-2018 that a project to import LNG into Sharjah, in the United Arab Emirates, had slipped two years behind its original schedule and was now expected to start operation in 2020.