Yemen said to export first liquefied natural gas cargo Nov. 7

SANA’A (Bloomberg) -- Yemen will export its first cargo of liquefied natural gas on Nov. 7 as it seeks to expand oil and gas revenue, two people familiar with the matter said.

Yemeni President Ali Abdallah Saleh along with Yves-Louis Darricarrere, the head of exploration and production at French oil company Total SA, are expected to inaugurate the shipment from the LNG plant in Balhaf on the Arabian Sea, said the two people, who declined to be identified because they’re not authorized to comment publicly on the Yemen LNG project.

The first shipment is to South Korea’s Korea Gas Corp., they said, confirming a previous announcement by Yemen LNG. The cargo will be about 140,000 cubic meters of LNG, the two people said. Total declined to comment on the date of first exports.

The $4.5 billion project is the largest industrial project in impoverished Yemen, a nation that pumps about 330,000 barrels a day of oil and is not a member of OPEC.

The plant started production on Oct. 15 and will produce 6.7 million tons of LNG per year, when fully operational, according to Yemen LNG. An LNG tanker, Hyundai Ecopia, was due to arrive in Yemen on Oct. 31, according to ship-tracking data from AISLive on Bloomberg.

Total owns 40 percent of the Yemen LNG joint venture. Other shareholders include Yemen Gas Co., Dallas-based Hunt Oil Co., South Korea’s SK Corp., Korea Gas Corp., Hyundai Corp. and Yemen’s General Authority for Social Security and Pensions, according to Yemen LNG’s Web site.

The Yemen project will help Total close a gap with larger European-based LNG suppliers Royal Dutch Shell Plc, BG Group Plc and BP Plc, according to an Oct. 19 report from Bank of America- Merrill Lynch analyst Alejandro Demichelis.

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