Woodside takes on advanced LNG project on US Gulf Coast

Energy behemoth Woodside (ASX:WDS) has announced it will add to its global portfolio with the acquisition of an advanced project on the US Gulf Coast, the Driftwood LNG development opportunity.

Woodside is set to take on Driftwood through its acquisition of all remaining stock in Texas-based natural gas company Tellurian (NYSE: TELL) – which runs the project – for the price of $900 million, or $1.00 per share of the outstanding stock.

Located near Lake Charles in Louisiana, Driftwood is an opportunity which is fully permitted, and has reached the pre-final investment decision (FID) stage, and is comprised of five LNG trains through four phases, with a total permitted capacity of 27.6 million tonnes per annum.

CEO Meg O’Neill said that taking on the project represented Woodside’s investment in the energy transition.

“The acquisition of Tellurian and its Driftwood LNG development opportunity positions Woodside to be a global LNG powerhouse,” she said.

“It adds a scalable US LNG development opportunity to our existing approximately 10 Mtpa of equity LNG in Australia.

“Having a complementary US position would allow us to better serve customers globally and capture further marketing optimisation opportunities across both the Atlantic and
Pacific Basins.

“The Driftwood LNG development opportunity is competitively advantaged. Woodside expects to leverage its global LNG expertise to unlock this fully permitted development and expand our relationship with Bechtel which is the EPC contractor for both Driftwood LNG and our Pluto Train 2 project in Australia.”

Woodside has been trading at $29.21.