HOUSTON, TEXAS (Editors at Energy Analytics Institute (EAI), 12.Mar.2025) — Energy briefs and highlights from Day 3 of CERAWeek by S&P Global 2025 in Houston, Texas spanning executive comments from Excelerate Energy, Origem Energia, Equinor, and EQT Corporation, among others.
— Excelerate Energy vice president, government relations and public affairs Derek Wong: “Natural gas is here to stay, that could point to the golden-age for natural gas and LNG. It’s [in the hands of] companies and governments in the region to take advantage of this.”
“In Argentina we’ve seen the development of an incentive Regime for Large Investments (RIGI) that is also providing interesting legal regulatory permitting Forex for investments over $200mn. So it doesn’t surprise me at all that LNG export projects are among the first to take advantage of the RIGI framework,” Wong said.
“When you are in the LNG infrastructure and downstream infrastructure space, you have to play the long game. You have to have predictability, rules of the game, you need to see that regulation and market are moving in the right direction,” Wong said.
— Sempra Infrastructure president Tania Ortiz Mena: “I think North America as a region is a very competitive region — Canada, the US and Mexico. It is, in fact, the only economic block, if you compare it to Asia or Europe, that has a solid foundation to be very efficient and so self-sufficient in terms of energy. So I think the long term view should be of North America as a block competing with other economic regions.”
“Obviously, each region of the world is developing at a different phase. The developing world has a lot of untapped demand. It’s not only about affordability, but simply about access to energy and a good portion of the global population is in the developing world. Those are the populations that are growing. Those are the economies that need to be developed. Those are the economies that need to industrialize. And, substituting wood and coal or more emission intensive fuel with natural gas, I think is key to the development of these regions,” Ortiz said.
— JERA Asia Pte. Ltd. CEO Izumi Kai: “We can diversify sources, not only with the United States, but also with the Middle East, Australia, etc. So we have abundant natural gas globally. So from a buyers’ perspective we always try to develop a strict balance of commitment, volume, country, term, etc, so that security sources can be assessed from a long-term perspective.”
“On average, energy demand continues to increase maybe 5% to 6% per year, so under such a situation, large-scale, renewable development is not easy. So therefore, while maximizing the local renewable development, LNG introduction, especially in the Asian countries where domestic gas reserves are declining — in countries like India, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Thailand, and the Philippines — switching from domestic gas to LNG is a natural consequence. Of course, price matters. However, the introduction of LNG is necessary to solve the local renewable issues in many countries,” Kai said.
“I strongly believe gas is an indispensable fuel to achieve economic growth [for those Asian countries with declining domestic resources], as well as for ensuring a stable energy transition. Natural gas, of course, is much cleaner than coal, but if we can deploy future CCS technologies at scale, like a post combustion CO2 capture etc, then the use of natural gas, the use of energy, could even be considered a decarbonization fuel,” Kai said.
— Origem Energia CEO Luiz Felipe Coutinho: “The first necessary integration that we have is between offshore and onshore fields and domestic power. The solution is right for Brazil, the infrastructure is there, we only need to solve the inefficiencies that persist to see the gas flowing to the natural gas market.”
— Baker Hughes executive vice president, industrial & energy technology Ganesh Ramaswamy: “More than 50% of the geothermal sources in the US went online in the 1980s. Technology was very different then. We are a lot more advanced today, and we can do a lot more. But the challenge with geothermal is the permitting process is a lot more burdensome than even oil and gas. So simplifying those processes in addition to leveraging existing technology portfolios to tap into those sources, would be, in my opinion, a no brainer, but we’ve got to get there. To provide geothermal would be a clean fuel, reliable fuel, reliable source, clean source, compared to others. So that’s one of the examples that I would point out from an innovation standpoint, to make it a holistic energy solution process.”
“Because of the Biden pause on LNG exports, we’ve seen a not so positive impact, in the sense that the ability for the US to supply increasing global energy demands has been stymied. The other thing is that countries are burning coal and other carbon heavy footprint sources instead of relatively cleaner gas based fuel and not to mention the economic impact and all that,” Ramaswamy said.
“Two or three years ago we were mostly talking about energy transition. Now we’re talking about energy transition and energy expansion. Because even in the last couple of years, the growth of secular trends around AI and data centers and all of that have spiked through to the point to which by the end of next year, the energy demand from data centers is going to be doubling, so essentially, be consuming as much energy as the entire country of Japan, for example, by magnitude standpoint. So what that means that in order to have an affordable, reliable and sustainable energy source, gas is the answer in many ways. Why? Because gas is not only a transition fuel, but can also be a destination fuel once you have the capture technologies figured out, and also simultaneously on displacing higher carbon fossil based technologies like coal and oil and so on and so forth,” Ramaswamy said.
— Equinor senior vice president and Brazil country manager Veronica Coelho: “We are working hard everyday to reduce the emissions in all we do and in every part of our value chain and then looking continuously at optimizing the portfolio of our projects and activities to ensure this robustness and resiliency to both price volatility and to a future of lower carbon emissions is achieved.”
“In Brazil, gas will play an important role to balance intermittency that we see that every sort of renewable will have. I think the challenge is how to make that possible given the swings in demand that this potentially represents. I see a lot of opportunities, a lot of challenges, and the key for us again is to ensure competitiveness, resilience, and robustness in our portfolio.”
“One thing that is critical to us given the natural set of uncertainties that we have in this market … the more we can eliminate uncertainty through policies, the more competitive the market will become.”
“Predictability and stability of the rules is absolutely critical. Having a balanced position throughout the value chain is also important.”
— Colombian Natural Gas Association Luz Stella Murgas: “We need to do a lot because social justice is not just access, it’s also quality. We have to do a lot to make it a just energy transition and policy of course has a special and essential role. Affordable and reliable energy is what in the end could make the energy transition just and viable in Latin America and we need to work together on that.”
“Regulation needs to promote market growth instead of hindering it. Complete regulation can slow down investments … at the end regulations need to attract investments.”
“At the end of the day, what can integrate a region is strategic development strategic infrastructure.”
— EQT Corporation president and CEO Toby Rice: “Three big themes for natural gas: continued evolution of energy systems, methane, and LNG. In the past twelve months we’ve seen another theme: power demand from an AI perspective … and a 20%-40% demand increase for natural gas just from the US.”
“Mountain Valley runs 300 miles. The $8bn project required Congress to get approved. Permits got yanked out and vacated. Everybody should be concerned that it takes Congress to vote to build a pipeline. Pipeline cancellation movement is dangerous.”
“The LNG pause was damaging from a reputation standpoint. We have used political and not market forces. Now America needs to make it clear that we are driven by market sources. Make clear that we are the most reliable source of energy.”
— Freeport LNG CEO and founder Michael Smith: “The world needs much more LNG. There’s a recognition that the LNG transition is not going to be using natural gas as a bridge fuel, it’s the base load fuel to create the electrons necessary for AI and 7 billion people who don’t have our lifestyle and want a piece of our pie.”
“[We have] 1 terminal in Freeport, Texas … and according to [Joe] Biden we had a negative impact on the Gulf Coast. This is not true, we are contributing $100mnin taxes to the community in Freeport, Texas.”
“Other than Covid-19 summer, we sold every molecule we produced, because demand over passed the forecast. In 2025, look at forecasts. No offense S&P and WoodMac, they said there was gonna be a glut in 2025, that moves to 2026 now to 2027, 2028, and 2029. It’s all because of demand. Demand is really hard to predict. Who was talking about AI 2 years ago, the biggest increase in energy.”
“The minority have said, when there’s peace some Russian gas will come back but it’s not anywhere near where it used to be. The majority say Russian gas is not coming back. Not the first time it’s been cut-off. Russia has cut off multiple times years ago to negotiate higher prices. Europe wants energy security, America provides that.”
“Europeans are willing to sign 20 year contracts. I met with the EU yesterday, they told me that 2050 net-carbon zero doesn’t mean no natural gas. In 2050 you are going to balance it with other sources of energy.”
— S&P Global head of global gas and power, consulting Eric Eyberg: “US LNG exports are half the size of semiconductor exports … a $400bn in GDP impact, 270,000 jobs through LNG. US LNG supplied 42% of the gap of Russian gas left in the EU.”
Energy at the Crossroads
— Iberdrola executive chairman Ignacio Galan: “Demand in all countries is now increasing. In traditionally advanced countries demand has been flat but is now growing.”
— Siemens Energy president and CEO Christian Bruch: “We are building a resilient energy supply system. If I look today, I see more realism on what it takes to drive this industry to an unprecedented growth level. We are hiring 13,000 people this year just to grow.”
— Siemens executive board member Tim Holt: Like how a traffic jam starts, “permitting something stops, then the whole supply chain stops which is one of my biggest worries … it’s also about reducing the administrative workload.”
Global Gas
— The Williams Companies president and CEO Alan Armstrong: There has been an increase in demand in LNG, power generation and electrification, which is leaning hard on natural gas supply.
“Political difficulty of getting infrastructure built is where we are at risk. Our technology continues to grow. We continue to expand that base, but even when technically recoverable. The political recovery is a challenge. We’ve got to work harder.”
— Venture Global LNG CEO and executive co-chairman Michael Sabel: “The world is going to use a lot more electricity. A growing global middle class that’s going to gentrify and improve standard of living. A lot of gas to supply that.”
“The business modem is going to stay similar. US unique: multiple gas, interconnected with 100s of thousands of miles of gas pipelines. Capital supported by national demand and industrial demand. Invest capital to innovate and lower cost.”
— Oneok CEO Pierce Norton II: In terms of getting the necessary transmission and distribution projects completed to meet growing demand needs, “last year we moved 40 trillion meters of natural gas. I’m confident we’re going to get this done.”
— Secretary Bureau of Energy Resources acting assistant secretary Laura Lochman on whether there’s any prospect of Russian pipeline gas [Nordsteam] coming back as part of an agreement?
“I can’t comment on what may or may not transpire, and obviously we’re in conversations with the Ukrainians. We just had a successful conversation this weekend in Saudi Arabia. There will be further conversations with Russia, but the whole focus is trying to get the parties to the table and end up with a lasting and durable peace. There are a number of issues that are factors that are at play. One is that on the Nordstream project, specifically, there are still US sanctions in place on that project and on the company. [Another problems relates to] Germany, has never certified that infrastructure. Those are just two of the things. There’re many steps, two of the potential barriers, and as it’s been stated here, diversification, we’ve learned, is of the utmost.”
____________________
By Editors reporting from Houston. © 2025 Energy Analytics Institute (EAI). All Rights Reserved.
