Argentina's state-owned oil and gas company YPF has awarded a pre-front-end engineering design (Pre-FEED) services contract to McDermott for a 5 Mt/year liquefaction project at the Vaca Muerta shale field in the Neuquén region of Argentina. The project would tap Vaca Muerta gas resources and could later be expanded to 10 Mt/year.
The 0.5 Mt/year (0.67 bcm/year) floating LNG (FLNG) vessel Caribbean FLNG, which was redeployed by Exmar under the name Tango FLNG in the Port of Bahía Blanca in Argentina, was commissioned in June 2019. It started to produce LNG from the Vaca Muerta shale gas field and is expected to export up to eight LNG cargoes each year under the framework of a 10-year agreement with the state-controlled oil company YPF. Argentina thus entered the pool of around 20 countries exporting LNG and that can take advantage of the seasonal opportunity with Asian markets.
Shale gas reserves in the Vaca Muerta Block are estimated to amount 308 Tcf (around 8,700 bcm) of shale gas and 16.2 Gbl of shale oil. Once fully developed, the development of the Vaca Muerta play reserves could restore Argentina's energy independence.
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