Taiwan’s LNG import growth slows to 4 percent in February

CPC Corp. imported 1.02 million kiloliters, or 462,000 metric tons, of the fuel, costing US$313 million in February, compared with 978,000 kiloliters at a cost of US$204 million a year earlier, the government’s Energy Bureau said in an e-mailed statement yesterday. State-owned CPC is Taiwan’s only LNG importer.

The island imports more than 95 percent of its natural gas needs. LNG prices climbed last year after the closure of the world’s biggest nuclear power plant in Japan resulted in a surge in demand for the fuel by Tokyo Electric Power Co., which owns the atomic station. Electricity generators account for about 75 percent of Taiwan’s LNG consumption.

CPC paid US$673.84 a ton, or about US$13 per million British thermal units in February, near the record US$679.20 a ton in January, according to the energy bureau.

Purchases from Indonesia fell 20 percent from January to 539,200 kiloliters last month, while Malaysian supplies declined 6.9 percent to 339,400 kiloliters from the previous month, according to government data. CPC bought 146,000 kiloliters from Nigeria in February.

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