Japan’s monthly LNG imports continue to decline

Japanese imports of liquefied natural gas continued to decline this year and they dropped for the third consecutive month in March.

Japan, the world’s largest importer of LNG, received 7.2 million tonnes of the fuel last month, down 1.2 per cent from a year earlier.

March LNG imports cost Japan about $3.56 billion, a decline of 13.5 per cent year-on-year, according to the provisional data released by Japan’s Ministry of Finance.

LNG deliveries from Asia from countries such as Malaysia and Indonesia increased by 0.1 per cent to 1.74 million tones, the data shows.

Middle East LNG shipments from sources like Qatar declined by 29.4 per cent to 937,000 tonnes.

Shipments from Russia dropped 0.2 percent to 522,000 tonnes while US deliveries almost doubled to 394,000 tonnes.

On the other side, as LNG imports show a downward trend, Japan boosted coal imports for power generation.

Japan imported 9.88 million tonnes of coal in March, a rise of 3.4 per cent year-on-year, the ministry’s data shows.