HOUSTON, Sept 10 (Askume) – Hurricane Francine intensified late on Tuesday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said, forcing residents of Louisiana to flee their homes and forcing oil and gas companies to shut down production in the Gulf of Mexico.
Francine is developing more slowly than first forecast but could bring deadly winds, heavy rain and storm surges up to 10 feet (3 meters) to the Louisiana coast on Wednesday.
The hurricane center said maximum sustained winds reached 75 mph (120 kph) late Tuesday night, making the storm a Category 1 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Category 5 scale.
The storm is headed toward the southern Texas coast and is expected to make landfall near Thibodeau, Louisiana, on Wednesday. Its roads pose a major challenge to the region’s recently built liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plants.
Energy companies have shut down oil production of 412,070 barrels per day, about 24% of US Gulf of Mexico output , and evacuated workers from 130 production platforms, the US Maritime Safety and Environmental Enforcement Agency said on Tuesday.
About 494 million cubic feet per day, or 26% of the Gulf’s natural gas production, is offline, according to reports submitted to offshore regulators.
The region accounts for about 15% of US oil production and 2% of natural gas production.
US natural gas prices rose nearly 3% on concerns about production shutdowns and the potential impact on liquefied natural gas plants. Concerns about global oil demand added fuel to the fire, with US crude oil futures falling more than 4%.
Refineries and fuel distributors along Louisiana’s coast are preparing for the storm. Citgo Petroleum said its Lake Charles refinery is implementing hurricane contingency plans.
The Port of Brownsville near the Mexican border and other smaller terminals in Texas remained closed Tuesday, while others, including Houston, Galveston, Corpus Christi, Texas City and Freeport ports, remain restricted.
The Coast Guard said ports from Beaumont to Plaquemines between Texas and Louisiana were closed to shipping.
In New Orleans, port officials are preparing to shut down terminals and rail operations, with service expected to resume Thursday after damage is assessed. The ports of Houma, Morgan City and the Louisiana offshore oil port were closed to shipping, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.
Ports in Mississippi and Alabama, including Pascagoula, also began preparing for the storm but remained open Tuesday. After landfall, Center Francine is expected to make landfall in Mississippi on Wednesday night or Thursday.
Oil producers ExxonMobil (XOM.N) , Shell (SHEL.L) and Chevron (CVX.N) laid off offshore workers and cut production. Pipeline operator Enbridge Corp (ENB.TO) has also recalled workers at several U.S. platforms in the Gulf of Mexico.
Louisiana is home to three of the country’s seven largest LNG export plants. The new plants — Sempra’s (SRE.N) Cameron LNG, Venture Global LNG’s Calcasieu Pass LNG and Tellurian’s (TEL.A) Driftwood LNG development — are all downriver from Francine.
Natural gas throughput at Cameroon’s LNG export plants fell to 1.3 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) on Tuesday from about 2.2 bcfd on Monday, LSEG data showed. Sempra did not respond to a request for comment.
Freeport LNG, which operates the second-largest ultra-cooled natural gas export plant in the United States, said its plant in Texas had begun preparing for the storm but did not give details.
