Reston, Virginia-based Bechtel has finalized and executed $9 billion in contracts for construction work at the Rio Grande LNG Facility in Brownsville, Texas, according to a news release from Houston-based oil and gas firm NextDecade, the owner of the facility.
NextDecade said that its subsidiaries finalized a pricing refresh of its lump-sum, turnkey engineering, procurement and construction contract with Bechtel for the construction of Train 4 and related infrastructure, according to the release. It also executed a lump-sum, turnkey EPC contract with Bechtel for similar work with the forthcoming Train 5.
The company will pay Bechtel approximately $4.77 billion for the EPC contract for Train 4, according to the news release, and $4.32 billion for the work on Train 5.
In addition, both contracts feature pricing validity clauses that extend to Sept. 15, according to the news release. Zacks Equity Research, an investment service firm based in Chicago, noted that this clause implies Bechtel won’t increase the costs associated with these two trains prior to the listed date.
Bechtel is already building Phase 1 of the Rio Grande LNG Plant for $12 billion, including the first three liquefaction trains at the facility.
The project took a hit in 2024 after a federal appeals court overturned the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s authorization for Train 4. The court said the agency should have issued a supplemental environmental impact statement before approving the build.
However, in March the court overturned its previous decision, which allows NextDecade to proceed, according to law firm Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, which represented NextDecade.
FERC issued a draft SEIS for the first five liquefaction trains at the Rio Grande LNG Facility in March, with a final SEIS to be issued in July. A corporate presentation from May noted that the company expects FERC to reauthorize the project by November.
The overall project completion percentage for trains 1 and 2 and the common facilities of the Rio Grande LNG Facility was 42.8% as of March, according to NextDecade’s first quarter business update in May. For Train 3, it was 17.8%, and all three figures were in line with the timeline under the EPC contract.
