A $380 million offshore gas project in Puerto Rico is stalling, caught up in the fallout from a $9 billion utility bankruptcy, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday. Excelerate Energy LP gave notice last week it had canceled contracts with Puerto Rico’s electric utility to construct a floating natural gas terminal off the island’s southern coast. The cancellations weren’t widely known until Wednesday, when local energy regulators demanded an explanation from the public utility known as Prepa. The planned Aguirre Offshore GasPort project, or AOGP, was designed to import cheap natural gas, helping to wean Puerto Rico’s electric utility off dirtier sources of fuel. Now the project’s timetable is in doubt over PREPA’s deteriorating financial condition and the open-ended process of reordering its liabilities. Federal financial oversight officials placed the utility under bankruptcy protection last month, heightening the likelihood of losses to debtholders owed $9 billion.
For updated news and analysis of Puerto Rico's debt crisis, along with current docket filings in Puerto Rico's case, be sure to visit ABI's "Puerto Rico in Distress" webpage.
