In a statement issued Thursday afternoon, Tellurian announced that Cheniere Energy has permanently dismissed all claims against the company that were set to go to trial next month in a Houston district courtroom, Chairman Charif Souki and Vice Chairman Martin Houston.
“Although this frivolous lawsuit was clearly an attempt to disrupt the hard work and success we are having at Tellurian, it never distracted us from our focus on building Tellurian’s global natural gas business, beginning with Driftwood LNG,” Souki said in the statement.
Driftwood LNG is a proposed 27.6 million tons per year liquefaction export facility and associated infrastructure that will be located near Lake Charles, Louisiana on the U.S. Gulf Coast. The proposed facility is situated on roughly 1,000 acres of land with deep water access, and ample pipeline infrastructure.
The project is backed by a lump sum turn key engineering and procurement contract with Bechtel that guarantees cost, performance and schedule. Bechtel has progressed the engineering to over 28% complete, all construction permits have been secured, and the project is shovel ready. Work is expected to begin this year, with first liquefaction in 2023.
Commercially, Tellurian has contracted with Total as an equity partner, and in late 2019, Tellurian signed a memorandum of understanding with Petronet in the presence of India’s Prime Minister Modi and with the support of both U.S. and Indian governments.
“I look forward to my next trip to India and anticipate finalizing our agreements by the end of March,” Souki said.
