Jera Brings 1st US Shale LNG into Japan

Jera, the 50-50 supply & trading joint venture of Japanese utilities Tokyo Electric and Chubu Electric, announced that it imported the first US LNG cargo liquefied from shale gas into Japan on January 6; it arrived at Chubu Electric's Joetsu LNG terminal. 

It was supplied by US firm Cheniere Marketing as one of its own cargoes and loaded onto the Oak Spirit tanker at its Sabine Pass LNG terminal in Louisiana December 7, with the voyage to Japan via the Panama Canal taking about one month.

Jera said it believes that buying US LNG will contribute to a stable energy supply in Japan by diversifying supply sources and LNG price indices.

Shipowner Teekay's 173,400 m3 Oak Spirit tanker recently traversing the Panama Canal en route from Sabine Pass to Japan (Photo credit: Teekay)

Last month Jera's trading subsidiary signed binding agreements to take over EDF Trading’s coal and freight trading business although EDFT will acquire 33% of shares in the Jera Trading subsidiary in the process. Once completed in April, Jera Trading will be one of the world's largest coal traders.

Mark Smedley