Cheniere Energy greenlights Corpus Christi Midscale Trains 8 & 9 project, optimizes operations, increases LNG supply, and drives substantial financial growth.
Cheniere Energy made several announcements regarding its LNG projects, including:
“We are pleased to announce the FID of CCL Midscale Trains 8 & 9 today, an important milestone for Cheniere as we continue to grow our infrastructure platform to over 60 MTPA,” said Jack Fusco, President and CEO of Cheniere. “We expect CCL Midscale Trains 8 & 9 to be executed seamlessly with Corpus Christi Stage 3, where Train 1 achieved Substantial Completion in March, and Train 2 achieved first LNG production this month. We look forward to bringing this much-needed new LNG supply to market safely, on time and on budget.”
CCL Midscale Trains 8 & 9 consist of two midscale trains with an expected total liquefaction capacity of over 3 MTPA of LNG and other debottlenecking infrastructure. It is being built adjacent to the Corpus Christi Stage 3 Project. Once complete, along with expected debottlenecking and CCL Stage 3, the Corpus Christi LNG terminal is expected to reach over 30 MTPA in total liquefaction capacity later this decade.
“Our upwardly revised run-rate production4 and financial forecasts are a direct result of Cheniere’s operational excellence program and continuous efforts to economically debottleneck and optimize our business,” said Zach Davis, Cheniere’s Executive VP and CFO of Cheniere. “Our progress deploying capital toward disciplined accretive growth, opportunistic share repurchases, balance sheet management and growing dividends, combined with today’s updates, solidifies the goals of our ‘20/20 Vision’ capital allocation plan, and positions Cheniere to deploy over $25 billion of available cash through 2030 to achieve over $25 per share of run-rate DCF.”
Cheniere is also developing more brownfield liquefaction capacity expansions at Corpus Christi and Sabine Pass terminals, slated for execution in a phased approach, starting with initial single-train expansions at each site, which, if completed, would grow Cheniere’s LNG platform to up to approximately 75 MTPA of capacity by the early 2030s.
In March, Cheniere, in cooperation with Bechtel Energy, substantially completed and commissioned Train 1 at the Corpus Christi Stage 3 Liquefaction Project (CCL Stage 3), obtaining care, custody, and control for the completed asset. As of late January 2025, the overall CCL Stage 3 project completion was 78.3%, reflecting:
CCL Stage 3 consists of seven midscale liquefaction trains, with an expected total production capacity of over 10 MTPA of LNG. Once substantial completion is finished for all seven trains, the facility’s projected total production capacity will be over 25 MTPA of LNG. Cheniere issued Bechtel full notice to proceed on CCL Stage 3 in June 2022, with first LNG production from Train 1 achieved in December 2024 and the first cargo loaded in February 2025.
