The island bought 2.01 million kiloliters, or 915,227 metric tons, of the cleaner-burning fuel, compared with a year earlier, data from the Bureau of Energy showed yesterday. The LNG import bill rose 35 percent to US$682.7 million, or US$746 a ton, compared with a year earlier.

“There was possibly higher use of LNG by power generators,” Wei Juen-shen, a planning official at the energy bureau, said by telephone yesterday.

The island imports more than 95 percent of its gas needs, with generators accounting for about 80 percent of LNG consumption. Taiwan Power Co., the island’s monopoly grid operator, expects electricity demand to increase at the slowest pace in seven years in 2008 because of the global recession.

Taiwan bought a total of 400,700 kiloliters of spot LNG, or about three cargos, from Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea in October at an average price of US$931 a ton (US$17.74 per million British thermal units), the bureau said in an-emailed statement. That compares with a U.S. benchmark gas price of about US$6.47 per million Btu at Henry Hub.

Taiwan’s LNG import costs in October fell 14 percent compared with September as crude prices dropped by almost $100 from its record price in July to as low as US$48.25 a barrel in New York on Nov. 21.

The island also imported LNG from Malaysia, Indonesia and Qatar under multi-year contracts. CPC Corp., the state-owned oil refiner, is the island’s only importer of LNG.

LNG is natural gas that has been chilled to liquid form, reducing it to one-six-hundredth of its original volume at minus 161 degrees Celsius (minus 259 Fahrenheit), for transportation by ship to destinations not connected by pipeline. On arrival, it’s turned back into gas for distribution to power plants, factories and households.

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