Poland will become the center for re-export of American liquefied natural gas (LNG) in the future, the United States’ Ambassador to Poland Georgette Mosbacher said at the first seminar on development of the LNG market in Eastern Partnership countries, the CFTS portal reports.

According to Mosbacher, LNG exports from the United States are constantly increasing. “We are one of the largest suppliers of LNG, which goes to 30 countries on five continents,” she said. “By 2020, exports will amount to 120 billion cubic meters or about 30% of all LNG supplies.”

Mosbacher noted that the United States signed several contracts with Poland for supply of about 7.5 billion cubic meters of LNG per year to this European country at the end of last year. "Poland will become a re-export center in this region," she said.

The Eastern Partnership (EaP) is an EU program aimed at bringing Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine closer to the European Union.

An additional program was formulated in November 2018 at the initiative of Poland, the purpose of which is to interest EaP participating countries in development of a global LNG market. The project is funded by the European Commission. It is coordinated by Poland and Ukraine. Four seminars are scheduled under the program in 2019.

The Polish state-owned PGNiG oil and gas company signed a 20-year contract for supply of 2 million tons of LNG per year (about 2.7 billion cubic meters after regasification) with the U.S.-based Port Arthur LNG company in December 2018.

A 24-year contract for supply of LNG was signed with U.S.-based Cheniere Marketing International in early November 2018. Under this contract, Poland will annually receive about 0.52 million tons of LNG (0.7 billion cubic meters of gas after regasification) in the period of 2019-2022 and 1.45 million tons of LNG (1.95 billion cubic meters) in the period of 2023-2042.

PGNiG signed a 20-year contract for supply of 2 million tons of liquefied gas to Poland per year (2.7 billion cubic meters of gas after regasification) with U.S.-based Venture Global LNG in October.

The main gas supplier to Poland is currently the Russian-based Gazprom company, which accounted for 67% of the total volume of natural gas that PGNiG imported in 2018 (13.53 billion cubic meters).

Poland plans to completely stop purchasing Russian gas at the end of 2022.

As the CFTS portal reported earlier, the capacity of a future LNG terminal in Hamburg (Germany) will be increased from 5 billion cubic meters to 8 billion cubic meters per year due to high demand.