Freeport LNG Development LP’s export facility on the upper Texas coast was still offline on Wednesday, four days after it was shut down ahead of former Hurricane Beryl as the region continued to grapple with the effects of the storm.
“We intend to resume liquefaction operations when post-storm assessments are complete, and it is safe to do so,” Freeport spokesperson Heather Browne told NGI on Wednesday, adding that there were no other updates.
No liquefied natural gas tanker had been loaded at the terminal since July 4, according to Kpler ship-tracking data. Four vessels signaling for the terminal were floating nearby offshore on Wednesday.
Feed gas nominations were only 150 MMcf on Wednesday, according to NGI data, or 6% of the pipeline capacity available to feed the 2.1 Bcf/d facility. Freeport was taking in about 1.6 Bcf/d before it was shut down on Sunday.
Beryl made landfall about 50 miles from the facility between Houston and Corpus Christi. Unlike most LNG export terminals on the Gulf Coast that have a private electricity supply, Freeport relies on the power grid.
Nearly 1.7 million customers were still without power across Southeast Texas on Wednesday. Brazoria County, where the Freeport facility is located, was among the hardest hit. According to poweroutage.us, of the 46,000 tracked there, more than 31,000 were still without power.
Wood Mackenzie’s Eugene Kim, research director of Americas Gas Research, told NGI that the firm’s data showed power draw from Freeport is still minimal.
Elsewhere on the Gulf Coast, the storm skirted Corpus Christi and Sabine Pass, home to LNG export terminals. Cheniere Energy Inc. implemented its severe-weather preparedness plan at its Corpus Christi terminal, but operations were not disrupted there or at its Sabine Pass terminal in Louisiana.
Feed gas nominations at both terminals were strong at more than 80% of capacity, NGI data showed Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the Golden Pass LNG export project, underway in Sabine Pass near the Louisiana border, was expecting to ramp up construction work on Wednesday.
“The site was secured in advance of the storm by on-site personnel per existing safety protocols,” spokesperson Clark Vega told NGI. “Safety assessments have been conducted post storm and construction work will resume…”
No Power, No Gas, No Fun
In the fourth-most populated city in the United States, residents on Wednesday struggled for the third day in a row in the aftermath of Beryl. The region also remained under a heat advisory, with the heat index forecast to reach as high as 106.
CenterPoint Energy Inc., which serves most Houston customers, said crews had “been assigned and are focusing on restoring electric infrastructure including facilities essential to health and public safety.” The company’s website early Wednesday showed more than 1.37 million customers still were without power, down from 2.26 million-plus as Beryl strafed the region two days earlier.
Another 65,000 Greater Houston area customers served by the Texas-New Mexico Power Co. (TNPC) also were without power. In Brazoria County east of Houston, about 31,000 had not seen their power return. And in Galveston, 33,000 remained without service.
TNPC remained in “full restoration mode,” a spokesperson said. However, the spokesperson said it was difficult to restore services as communication services also were downed by the storm.
State and local officials promised action.
Houston Mayor John Whitmire said the city would hold CenterPoint accountable.
“We’re in constant touch with CenterPoint," he said in a press conference. “We’re holding them accountable. I talk to their administrators every four hours for an update, and I’m convinced that we’re going to continue to push CenterPoint to do everything possible.”
The Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUCT) on X, formerly Twitter, said it has added an emergency item to the Thursday agenda. PUCT called for utilities “impacted” by Beryl to appear at the 9:30 a.m. CT open meeting in Austin. The hearing is to be livestreamed.
Frustration Rises
On X, outrage cascaded from all corners as Houston area residents searched for air conditioning, fuel and food.
Meteorologist Matt Lanza, managing editor of Space City Weather, shared his frustration.
“Restoration progress is slow today it seems,” Lanza wrote Wednesday on X. “Very slow. Believe less than 100,000 have come back” regarding power. “These things are hard and I’m the first in line to share that with people. But this is pretty bad. I don’t want to hear that the state is looking at this. This needs to be federal.”
Storm Chaser Houston said on the city’s westside there were “huge issues with finding gas, limits on food” and more than 600 signal lights not working.
To make matters worse, Colorado State University (CSU) and the Climate Research Center revised the seasonal Atlantic basin forecast by two, with expectations now for 25 named storms. CSU is forecasting 12 hurricanes and six major hurricanes in the Atlantic, one more each than previously forecast.
“We have slightly increased our forecast and continue to call for an extremely active Atlantic hurricane season in 2024,” CSU forecasters led by Philip J. Klotzbach said. “Sea surface temperatures averaged across the hurricane Main Development Region of the tropical Atlantic and Caribbean remain near record warm levels.
“Extremely warm sea surface temperatures provide a much more conducive dynamic and thermodynamic environment for hurricane formation and intensification.”
The probability for “at least” one major hurricane – a Category (Cat) 3, 4 or 5 – to make landfall after Monday (July 8) across the entire continental U.S. coastline is 57%. The full-season average from 1880-2020 is 43%.
For the Gulf Coast, from the Florida Panhandle westward to Brownsville, TX, near the Mexico border, the probability that a major Cat 3-5 hurricane would make landfall has risen to 38%, according to CSU. That compares with a full-season average of 27%.
The CSU team anticipates “cool neutral” El Niño-Southern Oscillation “during the peak of the Atlantic hurricane season, resulting in reduced levels of tropical Atlantic vertical wind shear.” Beryl “is also a likely harbinger of a hyperactive season,” Klotzbach and his team said.
“This forecast is of above-normal confidence. We anticipate a well above-average probability for major hurricane landfalls along the continental United States coastline and in the Caribbean.”
Space City Weather’s Lanza added on X, “This was a Cat 1. Imagine a similar-sized/tracked storm that’s a Cat 3. Or 4? Or 5? We are woefully, woefully underprepared here. And between the derecho and this, it shows. To the point where I wonder if the worst case scenarios shown by some are indeed the worst.”
In mid-May, the city of Houston area was struck by a derecho with winds of up to 100 mph. It caused widespread damage to the downtown area.
At What Cost
AccuWeather on Tuesday pegged preliminary total damage and economic losses from Beryl at $28-32 billion.
“Beryl will go down in the history books as a record-shattering hurricane,” AccuWeather chief meteorologist Jon Porter said. “This was a devastating storm early on, in what is expected to be a very busy and impactful hurricane season for the United States.”
The Houston area, Porter noted, “was particularly hard hit once again following the destructive thunderstorm windstorm in May. This time, eight-12 inches of rain combined with these winds, leading to widespread flooding and wind damage, with more than two million homes and businesses losing power.
“Extensive cleanup will be required with numerous trees and power lines downed and many streets flooded…It could take several days or even a week or more to get the power restored for the entire area,” Porter said.
Beyond the Houston area, Beryl caused tornadoes and flooding in East Texas, Arkansas and southeastern Missouri.
AccuWeather said its estimate included damage to homes, businesses, infrastructure, facilities, roadways and vehicles. It also included power outages.
“To put this event into context, last year Hurricane Idalia, which made landfall into the Big Bend of Florida, caused $18-20 billion in total damage and economic loss,” according to AccuWeather. “Hurricane Ian, in 2022, caused $180-210 billion.
“Hurricane Harvey, which impacted a similar area in Texas, caused $230 billion in total damage and economic loss in 2017 when the storm stalled over Southeast Texas for days, producing record rainfall amounts which led to catastrophic flooding.”
