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(Bloomberg) — A weeks-long outage at a major Australian liquefied natural gas export plant has dealt a further blow to a global market still reeling from the halt of operations in Qatar.<\/p>\n
Storm damage to Chevron Corp.\u2019s Wheatstone gas plant is hampering efforts to restart operations and the facility won\u2019t be back online fully for \u201ca number of weeks,\u201d the company said Sunday. The facility accounted for 2.4% of global LNG trade in February, shipping 11 cargoes \u2014 of which 10 went to Japan and one to Thailand, according to advisory EnergyQuest.<\/p>\n
Wheatstone was one of three LNG plants in Western Australia that had their output curbed by Tropical Cyclone Narelle late last week. Woodside Energy Group Ltd. said Sunday it\u2019s working to resume normal operations at its North West Shelf facility, while Chevron said its Gorgon site was operating at \u201cfull rates\u201d after an outage at one of its three production units.<\/p>\n
LNG supply has already been squeezed by the war in the Middle East, with the critical Strait of Hormuz effectively shut and the closure of the world\u2019s biggest plant in Qatar earlier this month. Most of that supply went to buyers in Asia, who have been looking to offset the shortfalls.<\/p>\n
Woodside said output is continuing at its Macedon and Pluto gas facilities. It also said ship loading at Pluto LNG, which wasn\u2019t affected by the storm, is restarting following the reopening on Saturday of Dampier port.<\/p>\n
–With assistance from Paul-Alain Hunt.<\/p>\n
(Updates throughout.)<\/p>\n
More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com<\/a><\/p>\n \u00a92026 Bloomberg L.P.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n