House Republicans To Link Ukraine Aid to LNG Project Approvals

House Republicans are mulling the possibility of linking potential financial aid to Ukraine to LNG export project approvals, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg on Thursday.

While the final wording for the potential aid package for Ukraine has yet to be approved, such a provision—to be included in the packgage—would require that some backlogged LNG export projects—ones that have been waiting for approval from the DOE—be approved.

Nothing has been set in stone yet, and the final wording for the aid package still needs to be decided on and approved, the anonymous source said.

Whether the package can get the needed votes remains unclear, although House Democrats are likely feeling the election-year squeeze of appeasing the party’s progressives that balked at Biden’s stance on Israel, and as such, are unlikely to support any language that calls for approvals for fossil fuel permitting.

If the provision is successful, LNG projects that will likely benefit the soonest are Commonwealth LNG’s Lousiana project and Energy Transfer’s Lake Charles export project, just to name a few.

A spokesman for Mike Johnson has previously linked Ukraine and LNG permitting by arguing that the DOE’s permitting pause hurts Ukraine by increasing dependence on Russian gas.

The House will return from its spring recess on April 9, and the bill is likely to make its way to the floor sometime soon after.

The Biden Administration paused all pending decisions on US LNG export projects back in January until the Department of Energy can update the underlying analyses for authorizations.

The U.S. oil lobby referred to President Biden’s actions as “a win for Russia,” while environmentalists referred to it as a “historic win.”

By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com

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