MET Croatia Energy Trade, a 100 per cent subsidiary of Switzerland based MET Group, submitted a binding offer to LNG Croatia to book capacities in the Krk LNG terminal for a three-year period, amounting to 1.3 billion cubic metres overall as earlier reported by the terminal.
Significant changes in the international energy markets are spearheaded by the rapid growth of global LNG trade, a development that MET Group is welcoming.
“MET Group is actively monitoring the global growth for liquefied natural gas and increasing the volume of LNG delivered day by day,” said Mario Matković, CEO of MET Croatia Energy Trade. “To succeed on the LNG market, apart from the specific knowledge with a global LNG desk, it is necessary to have a local presence, including market access for gas placement. We are the only player in the region that has both. Therefore, we have no doubt that booking the capacity in the LNG terminal in Krk will highly contribute to our long-term business strategy.”
The Croatian LNG project will help Central and Eastern Europe to become an integral part of this global market. Croatia’s neighbour Hungary, where MET Group began its operations in 2007, has always shown its interest for a comprehensive agreement that would connect the natural gas networks of the two countries, therefore it always pushed for negotiating the procurement of gas via the future Croatian LNG terminal.
In his most recent interview with CEENERGYNEWS, Hrvoje Krhen newly appointed Managing Director of LNG Croatia, spoke about potential partners, confirming that they were in communication with all interested potential terminal users from the region.
“Due to market development, Hungarian companies are interested in terms of cooperation in order to become terminal users and we look forward that this kind of cooperation will be realised in the months to come,” he underlined.
Croatian LNG imports will help MET Group link most of its downstream markets both from pipeline gas and from an LNG perspective as well. MET International, the supply and trading arm of MET Group opened and has been successfully operating its LNG desk since 2016, delivering LNG cargos primarily into its natural gas supply markets in Spain and Italy. The LNG terminal in Krk represents a new supply point for the CEE region, bringing with it greater source diversification opportunities and, as a consequence, greater security of supply.
MET Croatia has been present in the country since 2013 and is one of the leading gas suppliers on the domestic market. MET Croatia is a member of MET Group, a European energy company headquartered in Zug and operating in 26 gas markets. MET Group has been working for 13 years and is the leading independent integrated energy company in the CEE region and other European markets including Spain and Italy.
