Ecopetrol Sells 81 GBTUD Through Nine Contingency Contracts as Cartagena Regas Terminal Halts for Five Days

Ecopetrol placed 81 GBTUD of natural gas on the market to cover a five-day preventive shutdown of the Cartagena regasification terminal, operated through SPEC LNG, scheduled between July 30 and August 3, 2026.

The volume was sold through nine Contingency Supply Contracts negotiated between July 8 and July 15, under existing regulation. Buyers include thermal generators and distributors serving residential demand and the vehicular natural gas market. Ecopetrol did not disclose the identity of the nine buyers or the value of the agreements.

Making the 81 GBTUD available requires adjustments to the producer's own operations across the five maintenance days, including fuel substitution. The company describes the volume as the result of an aggregate effort combining strategic fuel substitution and optimisation of operations at its various plants.

The preventive work covers terminal equipment and systems, including the floating storage and regasification unit known as the FSRU. SPEC LNG decided in May to bring forward its annual maintenance to prepare the terminal for a possible El Nino event and reduced hydrology in the final quarter of 2026.

The CREG identified possible impacts on plants including TEBSA, Termocandelaria, Flores and Barranquilla during the maintenance window. The regulator also adopted a temporary programme for voluntary reduction of electricity consumption in the departments of La Guajira, Cesar, Magdalena, Atlantico and Bolivar.

The Ministry of Mines and Energy issued measures to prioritise essential gas demand, coordinate the operations of sector agents and reduce the risk of public service interruptions during the maintenance. The contracting sits within the regulatory framework set by the Ministry of Mines and Energy and the CREG, following recommendations from the National Gas Operation Council.

"Ecopetrol ha venido participando en las diferentes mesas de trabajo institucionales de preparacion para este mantenimiento, coordinando esfuerzos con los diversos actores del sector para mitigar cualquier impacto," said Alvaro Casanova, manager of Gas and LPG at Ecopetrol.

For global gas traders, the mechanics matter more than the volume. A single import point going offline for five days pulled a regulated emergency contracting process, a regulator-issued demand-reduction programme across five departments, a ministerial prioritisation order and fuel switching inside a producer's own plants. The exposure is concentrated in gas-fired generation: four named thermal plants were flagged as potentially affected by the outage of one FSRU.

The timing decision is the other signal. Pulling annual maintenance forward to guard against a possible El Nino and weaker hydrology in the last quarter of 2026 treats the terminal as the swing supply source when hydro output falls. Systems that lean on a single regasification berth for dry-season firming face the same arithmetic anywhere: scheduled downtime has to be moved to the least-bad window, and the least-bad window is set by weather rather than by the operator.

Separately, El Heraldo reported that a former Ecopetrol official was sentenced to more than seven years in prison for receiving USD 12,000 to favour the award of a contract.