Brazil resumes LNG imports through Argentina

OREANDA-NEWS. February 11, 2015. Brazil has resumed LNG imports through Argentina?s Bahia Blanca terminal in order to restart the 640MW Uruguaiana thermoelectric plant in the southern state of Rio Grande do Sul.

AES Brasil, a unit of US utility AES, said the power station is expected to begin operating tomorrow.

The plant will operate for 60 days and will initially dispatch one 250MW turbine. At a later date, a second 250MW turbine will begin operating, AES said.

Each turbine consumes 1.2mn m3/d (42.2mn ft3/d) of natural gas.

The plant, which has operated intermittently over the past two years, will use regasified LNG that will be delivered to Brazil through a pipeline from Bahia Blanca.

Uruguaiana last operated in May 2014, but was taken off line after Brazil failed to reach an agreement with Argentina over LNG imports via Bahia Blanca.

Brazil has been dispatching nearly all of its thermal generating capacity because of a severe drought that has depleted its hydroelectric reservoirs.

In the first nine days of February, hydroelectric reservoirs in Brazil?s southeast/center-west subsystem increased by 0.6 percentage points to 17.4pc of capacity. February is typically the peak month of the rainy season, but precipitation has been sparse so far.

In January, Brazil imported 1.004mn tons of LNG, equivalent to about 32mn m3/d of gas, compared with just 146,769 t in January 2014.

The government is considering converting diesel and fuel oil-operated power plants to LNG in an effort to reduce operating costs.

State-controlled oil company Petrobras owns three regasification terminals in Brazil: 28mn m3/d Guanabara in Rio de Janeiro state, 7mn m3/d Pecem in Ceara state and 14mn m3/d Bahia in Bahia state.

The three terminals still have spare capacity. Brazil?s LNG imports increased by 5.8pc in 2014 to 4.07mn tons, equivalent to 15.38mn m3/d of natural gas, compared to 2013, according to trade ministry data.

Local firm Bolognesi Group plans to install two LNG receiving terminals and two associated power plants with more than 2,400MW of total generating capacity by 2019.

The Brazilian government's electric sector monitoring committee (CMSE) recently raised the risk of electricity supply deficits in the key southeast/center-west subsystem to 6.1pc from a previous 4.9pc.

Local electric energy think tank PSR said if precipitation levels are below average in March and April, there is a 100pc chance of power shortages.

PSR estimates that reservoir levels in the southeast/center-west subsystem need to reach 40pc of their capacity at the end of April to avoid shortages at the end of the dry season in November.