The June 8 explosion and resulting fire knocked the facility's pipelines out but the operator assured repairs would only take a few weeks; this has since been revised to several months, driving future prices for July delivery by 20% in same day trade.
All up explosions may cost Freeport 40 cargoes, or 4-5 million tonnes of LNG.
They closed Tuesday at US$7.20 per million British thermal units. They had been $9.60/MMBtu before this, or three times what they were a year ago.
In May prices were at a 14-year high. The Texas facility has nameplate capacity of 2.1 billion cubic feet per day with Rystad data cited by Reuters noting 1.17Bcfpd bebg sent to Europe.
Freeport LNG in Texas has a 14% share of the US LNG market, now one of the largest in the world and tipped to surpass Australia's in coming years.
The operator said two days ago it would take months to repair the plant after the explosion and resulting fire that put the train out of action.
It comes as Europe continues to scrabble for gas to replace Russian pipeline gas. Gazprom is dropping exports from its Nordstream pipeline to Germany.
European spot benchmark the TTF in the Netherlands rose 16% on the double punch of bad news.
The US price swings have US manufacturing associations seriously concerned
"It should be alarming to federal policymakers that the Freeport LNG terminal only exports 2 Bcfd, yet it is having such a significant impact to prices," Industrial Energy Consumers of America CEO Paul Cicio said.
