(Bloomberg) – ExxonMobil is close to lifting the force majeure in Mozambique that’s impeded progress on what will be one of the world’s biggest liquefied natural gas projects, Chief Executive Officer Darren Woods said in an interview.
The company will move ahead “fairly quickly” with a final investment decision on the Rovuma LNG project once the force majeure has ended, Woods said in a Bloomberg podcast interview in Sao Paulo at the COP30 climate summit.
The provision was put in place after Islamic State-linked militants carried out an attack on the nearby town of Palma, in northeast Mozambique in 2021, delaying the project for several years. TotalEnergies SE, which is working on a similar development nearby, is also lifting its suspension. Together, the Exxon and TotalEnergies projects promise to transform the economy of one of the world’s poorest nations while supplying gas to global markets for decades to come.
Exxon expects to lift the force majeure “in the very near future,” Woods said. “We took the time to focus really on the project development and refine the design and come up with what we thought was the best concept.
That work has been going. So I think we’ll be able to advance fairly quickly after force majeure is lifted to get into FID-ing the project and moving things along quickly.”
Woods spoke about why Exxon is on the lookout for low-cost resources to replace the 4.7 MMbbl it pumps every day, and its plans to meet oil and gas demand at least through 2050, despite efforts to transition away from fossil fuels.
