LNG (Liquefied Natural Gas)
LNG is natural gas — mostly methane — cooled to about −260°F until it becomes a liquid 1/600th its gas volume, so it can be shipped overseas where pipelines can't reach. It is not the same as NGLs.
Liquefied natural gas (LNG) is ordinary pipeline natural gas — predominantly methane — that has been chilled to roughly −260°F (−162°C), the point at which it condenses into a liquid occupying about 1/600th of its gaseous volume. Shrinking it that far is what makes it economic to load onto specialized tankers and move across oceans to markets a pipeline will never reach.
LNG is constantly confused with natural gas liquids (NGLs), but the two are different things. NGLs — ethane, propane, butane, and natural gasoline — are the heavier hydrocarbons separated out of the raw gas stream at a processing plant and sold as distinct products. LNG is the leftover methane itself, simply liquefied for transport and then re-gasified at the destination. One is a mix of byproducts; the other is the main product in a different physical state.
Mineral owners rarely sell their gas as LNG directly — the royalty gas leaves the wellhead as a vapor priced in Mcf or MMBtu. But the buildout of U.S. Gulf Coast LNG export terminals matters to royalty checks indirectly: export demand pulls on domestic gas supply and helps support the wellhead prices that royalties are paid on.