QatarEnergy Halts Ras Laffan LNG Ramp-Up After Iran Strikes Al Rekayyat Carrier, JKM Reaches $16.58 Per MMBtu

QatarEnergy Chief Executive Saad Al-Kaabi has paused plans to rapidly ramp up output at the Ras Laffan LNG complex after Iran struck the Qatari carrier Al Rekayyat in the Strait of Hormuz on July 7, 2026. The vessel was disabled and its crew abandoned ship. Operations at the world's largest LNG export complex will be kept at minimum levels for safety reasons. The number of vessels scheduled to dock at Ras Laffan has been cut in the coming days.

A Complex Already Carrying Battle Damage

The production pause arrives months after Ras Laffan sustained severe damage. Iranian drone attacks largely shut the facility in early March 2026. A subsequent Iranian missile strike damaged 17% of installed capacity, per Bloomberg, with full repairs expected to take three to five years. The complex sits 80 kilometres north of Doha and holds Qatar's entire LNG export infrastructure.

Qatar Was in the Middle of Its Biggest Expansion

Qatar's LNG production capacity stood at 77 million tonnes per annum before the conflict began. The North Field expansion program targets 142 million tonnes per annum by 2030, the world's largest single LNG growth project. North Field East Train 1 achieved first LNG in November 2025 and was ramping toward its 8-million-tonne-per-annum nameplate capacity through the first half of 2026. That ramp-up is now suspended.

Equity Partners TotalEnergies and ConocoPhillips Face a Supply Gap

The Ras Laffan pause directly affects companies holding equity stakes in Qatar's liquefaction trains. TotalEnergies holds interests in multiple QatarEnergy LNG trains and has long-term offtake agreements underpinned by North Field production. ConocoPhillips is an equity partner in Qatari LNG operations with supply commitments in Asian markets drawing on that output. Neither company has publicly revised forward supply guidance since the July 7 attack.

Both companies' long-term sale and purchase agreements depend on continued Ras Laffan throughput. With Ras Laffan at minimum operations, replacement volumes will need to be sourced on the spot market at current JKM prices. That adds cost for downstream buyers and compresses margins for offtakers reselling below the current spot level.

The Per-Cargo Cost of the Qatar Disruption

Asian LNG spot prices stand more than 80% above pre-war levels, per LNGPriceIndex.com. The Japan Korea Marker settled at $16.58 per MMBtu on July 10, 2026, up 2.07% on the day. Working from the 80% premium, the implied pre-war JKM baseline was $9.21 per MMBtu. A standard LNG spot cargo delivered to Northeast Asia holds 65,000 metric tonnes, or 3.4 million MMBtu.

At the current JKM price of $16.58 per MMBtu, that cargo costs a buyer $56.4 million. At the implied pre-war baseline of $9.21 per MMBtu, the same cargo carried a value of $31.3 million. The difference between those two figures is $25.1 million per cargo. Southeast Asian buyers paying that premium for prompt August delivery are transferring that cost directly to the market's supply-risk premium.

European Gas and the US Spread

TTF, the European natural gas benchmark, settled at $15.01 per MMBtu on July 10, per LNGPriceIndex.com. That equates to 49.42 euros per megawatt-hour. Henry Hub, the US benchmark, was $3.29 per MMBtu on the same day. The JKM-Henry Hub spread of $13.29 per MMBtu means each MMBtu shipped from the US Gulf Coast to Asia earns $13.29 of gross regional differential.

US Gulf Coast LNG export capacity to capture that spread is constrained. Freeport LNG's 17-million-tonne-per-annum terminal has been offline since late June for maintenance running through late August, as Oil Authority reported. With Ras Laffan at minimum operations and Freeport LNG offline, global LNG supply faces simultaneous pressure from two directions.

ADNOC and Rival Exporters Gain From Qatar's Setbacks

Qatar's repeated production disruptions since March 2026 have shifted global LNG contract negotiations toward competing exporters. ADNOC signed a 15-year Ruwais LNG supply deal with Japan's INPEX last week, as Oil Authority reported, marketing capacity that bypasses Hormuz entirely. Australia and the US offer routing flexibility that Middle East suppliers cannot currently match. Both have received increased buyer attention since Qatar's disruptions began, and the Ras Laffan pause reinforces that trend.