Spanish liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports and reloads decreased in March compared to the same month last year. Russia and the US were the biggest LNG suppliers to Spain in March, according to Enagas.
LNG imports decreased by 39.7 percent year-on-year to about 18 TWh in March and accounted for 65.5 percent of the total gas imports. In February, LNG imports reached about 18.4 TWh and in January imports reached some 20 TWh.
Including pipeline imports from Algeria (8.7 TWh), France, and Portugal, gas imports to Spain reached about 29.1 TWh last month, a drop from some 37.9 TWh in March last year, Enagas said in its monthly report.
Moreover, national gas demand in March decreased by 6.6 percent year-on-year to some 26.8 TWh.
Demand for power generation dipped by 25.4 percent year-on-year to about 4.76 TWh last month, while conventional demand decreased by 1.1 percent to 22 TWh, the LNG terminal operator said.
Storage facilities were were 81 percent full in March, compared to 78 percent in the same month last year and 79 percent in the prior month, according to Enagas.
Enagas operates a large network of gas pipelines and has four LNG import plants in Barcelona, Huelva, Cartagena, and Gijon.
It also owns 50 percent of the BBG regasification plant in Bilbao and 72.5 percent of the Sagunto plant, while Reganosa operates the Mugardos plant.
In August last year, Spanish power group Endesa delivered the first commercial cargo to the El Musel LNG terminal in Gijon.
However, the facility has still not reloaded a cargo since the commercial launch, the Enagas data shows.
Russia and US biggest LNG suppliers
The seven operational Spanish LNG regasification terminals, unloaded 43 cargoes last month, down by six cargoes compared to March last year, the data shows.
Russia was the biggest LNG supplier to Spain in March with about 7.48 TWh, up from 5.46 TWh last year, and the country was followed by the US with 5.28 TWh, a big drop compared to 11 TWh last year.
US was the biggest LNG supplier to Spain in January and February, while Russia was the biggest LNG supplier in December. Prior to that, US was the biggest supplier to Spain in October and November.
Besides Russia and the US, Spanish LNG terminals also received 3.5 TWh from Algeria in March, up from 2.87 TWh in the same month last year, and also 1 TWh from Belgium, 0.88 TWh from Nigeria, and 0.87 TWh from Qatar.
LNG reloads
Spanish LNG terminals loaded about 0.56 TWh in March, down 74.7 percent compared to some 2.23 TWh in the same month last year and also down compared to 1.07 TWh in February and 0.92 TWh in January.
The Barcelona LNG terminal reloaded about 0.21 TWh of LNG, the Sagunto terminal reloaded about 0.19 TWh, and the Huelva terminal reloaded some 0.15 TWh.
Moreover, the number of truck loads at the LNG terminals dropped by 8.3 percent year-on-year to 1048.
The Barcelona LNG terminal completed 215 truck loads in March, while the Cartagena terminal completed 204 truck loads and the Huelva terminal completed 190 truck loads, the data shows.