US firm’s FLNG back online offshore Mexico following outage

U.S. energy infrastructure player New Fortress Energy (NFE) has restarted production at its floating liquefied natural gas (FLNG) unit off the coast of Altamira, Mexico.

Shortly after the start of production at NFE’s inaugural Fast LNG installation, FLNG 1, and its first LNG cargo, transported by Energos Infrastructure’s Energos Princess LNG carrier (LNGC) to Mexico’s terminal for unloading, the unit was slated to undertake a scheduled maintenance program.

The FLNG project, encompassing three repurposed jack-up rigs off the coast of Altamira with a capacity of 1.4 million tons per annum (mtpa), was expected to be out of commission for several days. However, the unit was still scheduled to return to production mode and reach full production later during the month.

According to New Fortress Energy, the scheduled maintenance outage of the 1.4 mtpa Fast LNG 1 asset has been completed, and the FLNG unit returned to production on August 19. The company underlines that the FLNG 1 unit is expected to continue its production ramp-up before reaching full production later this month.

NFE has set the wheels in motion to expand the project by completing its previously announced $700 million loan for its second unit, FLNG 2, with construction works due to be finished in the first half of 2026. With approvals in hand, the U.S. company can export up to 7.8 million metric tons through April 2028 from the Altamira Fast LNG facility.

The export permit was granted by Mexico’s Ministry of Energy (SENER) once the project got the green light from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for the export of United States-sourced LNG to Mexico and other free trade agreement (FTA) countries.