LNG Imports and UK Terminals Explained

Britain imports more gas than it exports, and that single fact shapes everything about how the country heats its homes¹. Liquefied natural gas, usually shortened to LNG, is natural gas cooled to roughly minus 160 degrees until it becomes a liquid, shrunk to a fraction of its gaseous volume so it can be loaded onto tankers and shipped across oceans¹. For a country that cannot produce enough gas of its own, LNG is the flexible import that tops up the system whenever pipelines and domestic fields fall short.

The numbers explain why it matters. Over a five year average, UK Continental Shelf gas provides 43% of gross annual gas supply and the Norwegian Continental Shelf 35%, with LNG shipments making up 21% and interconnector pipeline imports from Belgium and the Netherlands 1%². GB has a total import capacity of around 368 million cubic metres per day (mcm/d), or 134 billion cubic metres per year (bcm/y), of which 150mcm/d comes from LNG². That tanker-borne share is the part of the supply mix most exposed to events far beyond Britain's borders, from damage at a Qatari export plant to war in the Red Sea.

Liquefied natural gas explained and why Britain relies on imports

The UK is a net importer of natural gas, meaning it imports more than it exports, which leaves it exposed to global price volatility¹. The government's own framing is blunter still:

Domestic production from the North Sea continues, but it no longer covers demand, and the gap is filled by a combination of pipelines from Norway and the near continent and tanker loads of LNG from much further afield.

LNG exists because gas cannot be shipped economically in its gaseous state. Chilling it into a liquid compresses it dramatically, so one tanker carries the energy of a very large volume of pipeline gas. The trade-off is cost and complexity, and every added stage sits outside British control:

• Liquefaction at an export plant on another continent
• Shipping in purpose-built tankers across sea routes that can be closed by war or weather
• Regasification at a British import terminal before the gas can enter the network

That is the independence question in miniature. A household burning gas from a UK field depends on a domestic asset. A household burning gas from a Qatari or American cargo depends on a liquefaction plant on another continent, a shipping route, a global price and a terminal on the British coast. The gas arrives at the same burner, but the chain behind it is far longer. For more on the overall mix, see Where Britain's Gas Comes From.

Terminals handle 150mcm/d of the UK's 368mcm/d gas imports

Britain's LNG arrives at a small number of coastal terminals, the principal ones being Isle of Grain on the Thames estuary in Kent and South Hook and Dragon at Milford Haven in Pembrokeshire. Together the LNG terminals give GB 150mcm/d of import capacity, out of a total import capacity of around 368mcm/d, or 134bcm/y, when pipelines are counted alongside it². That means roughly two fifths of the country's theoretical import capability flows through these three sites and their counterparts.

The concentration is worth noting. Milford Haven alone hosts two of the major terminals, so a single Welsh port handles a large slice of national LNG capability, while Isle of Grain sits close to the London demand centre it serves. Once the cargo is regasified, the gas enters the National Transmission System (NTS), a system of high pressure gas pipelines that transport gas from terminals and ports and is owned and operated by National Gas Transmission⁶. The terminals are therefore the hinge between the global shipping market and the British network, and their throughput rises and falls with cargo arrivals rather than with steady pipeline flow.

From ship to boiler: the journey of a cargo

The journey from tanker to boiler runs through three stages:

1. Discharge and regasification. The LNG is discharged at the terminal and warmed until it returns to the gas that was extracted at the export plant.
2. Transmission. It enters the NTS, the high pressure backbone owned and operated by National Gas Transmission, which moves gas from terminals and ports across Great Britain⁶.
3. Distribution. It leaves the transmission system into the regional distribution networks, operated by Cadent Gas Ltd, Northern Gas Networks Limited, SGN and Wales & West Utilities Limited, which carry it at lower pressure to streets and individual homes⁷.

For the household, nothing about this is visible. Gas from a Qatari cargo, a Norwegian pipeline and a UK field is physically identical once it is in the network, and it mixes freely on the way to your meter. The only difference is what happened before it arrived, and that difference shows up in price rather than in the gas itself.

It is also worth being clear about what is not yet in the pipes. Hydrogen boilers, sometimes discussed as a future alternative, are not currently available in the UK⁸. The gas reaching British boilers today is methane, whatever its origin, and the delivery chain described above is the one that will carry it for the foreseeable future. The networks themselves are described in more detail in Gas Distribution Networks and National Gas Transmission.

Britain's LNG suppliers, led by Qatar and the US

Qatar has been the anchor of the UK's LNG trade for two decades, accounting for 70 to 97% of LNG volumes imported to the UK since 2005⁴. That dominance has been diluted in recent years by the rise of American exports. UK LNG imports from the United States rose to 138,000 GWh in 2022⁹, a step change driven by the wave of new US export capacity that followed the shale boom. The first cargo from the newly started US export plant Cove Point was due to arrive in the UK on 20 March 2018⁴, an early marker of that shift.

Looking at gas imports as a whole, five countries account for the vast majority of the UK's supply⁴:

• Norway, dominant on the pipeline side
• The Netherlands and Belgium, supplying the interconnectors
• Qatar and Algeria, supplying the tanker trade alongside the United States

The mix shifts year to year with prices and with plant outages, and the 2026 cancellations at Qatar's Ras Laffan complex, covered below, show how quickly a comfortable mix can tighten.

The origin of a cargo matters to a household in one main way: exposure. A system supplied largely by one exporter is more sensitive to that exporter's problems than one with many suppliers, and the UK's LNG portfolio has become more diversified than it was a decade ago, which is a genuine resilience gain even if the price exposure remains global.

The share of UK gas supplied as LNG

The headline figure is 21%: over a five year average, the remainder of UK gas supply after domestic and Norwegian fields is primarily made up of LNG shipments². But the share moves around a great deal. In 2018 to date, LNG shipments accounted for just 2.9% of supplies⁴, a period when domestic production and pipelines covered most demand. By 2024, total UK LNG imports had reached 111,000 GWh, having fallen 31% from their earlier peak⁹.

The direction of travel for imports overall is upward. By 2025, the UK was expected to be importing 67% of its gas from outside the UK¹⁰, as North Sea output declines. That means the LNG share, and the pipeline share, will both tend to grow over time, and the country's exposure to global markets grows with them.

In practice, LNG's share is highest when Britain needs it most. Cargoes are drawn by price, so in cold weather or when pipelines are constrained, the UK bids tankers away from other buyers and the LNG share of supply rises sharply. In mild, quiet periods it falls back. The 21% average therefore hides a much wider operating range, and the system leans on LNG precisely when household demand is at its peak.

Pipeline and LNG imports compared

Pipelines and LNG do different jobs in the British system. Pipelines, above all the Norwegian ones, provide the steady base of imports that flows day after day. LNG provides the flexible top-up that can be bought cargo by cargo in response to price and weather. Interconnector pipeline imports from Belgium and the Netherlands, which play a key role in balancing supply and demand on cold winter days, provide 83mcm/d of capacity and averaged 1% of gross annual supply over five years². That small average share understates their importance: their value is concentrated in exactly the days when the system is tightest.

The balance has shifted over time. Netherlands pipeline imports supplied 2% of UK supplies in 2017, and in 2018 to date other pipelines carried another 20% of demand⁴. Pipeline imports are, in the main, cheaper per unit than LNG because they avoid the costs of liquefaction, shipping and regasification, but they are also less flexible: a pipeline delivers what it delivers, while a tanker can be redirected before it docks.

For the household, the practical distinction is this. Pipeline gas prices are set largely by European supply and demand. LNG prices are set by global competition, because the same cargo can be sold to Asia or Europe or the Americas. When Britain has to compete with Asian buyers for cargoes, the price of that gas, and its influence on the wholesale price behind every bill, rises accordingly. The mechanics of that pass-through are covered in How Wholesale Energy Markets Work and How Global Events Move UK Energy Prices.

Why cargoes get scrapped or sent elsewhere

LNG cargoes are not contracts for delivery to a fixed destination in the way pipeline gas is. A tanker can be redirected while at sea, and sellers cancel or defer cargoes when plants break down or when better prices appear elsewhere. Both have happened, and both have reached British bills.

In 2013, The Times reported UK gas storage levels at just 10% full and a Qatari LNG tanker being rerouted to top up UK supplies¹¹, an early illustration of how a storage shortfall forces the market to bid for floating cargoes. In 2026 the pattern repeated at larger scale. QatarEnergy cancelled five further LNG cargoes after damage at its Ras Laffan complex, with the cancelled cargoes due between late September and early November, and is reported to be seeking multi-year US supply through 2031¹². In the same period, Houthi forces took control of Yemen's Red Sea coastline between 10 and 14 September, adding war risk premium to LNG shipping¹².

The household consequence is measurable. Cornwall Insight forecast that bills would increase from 1 July 2026 by 10% to around £1,800 for the average household, amid Middle East conflict and Qatari LNG disruption¹³. The effect is not confined to Britain: around 81GW of planned gas capacity in Asia was cancelled in 2022 and 2023 amid LNG supply disruptions and price spikes following Russia's invasion of Ukraine¹⁴, showing how a supply shock in one region ripples into cancelled projects and higher prices in others.

The ban on Russian LNG imports

Russian LNG was a late and small arrival on the British scene. It became possible only when the Yamal LNG terminal opened in Siberia in December 2017, enabling Russian LNG shipments to the UK for the first time in official data⁴. During the March 2018 cold snap, a spike in gas prices caused by freezing temperatures drew additional cargoes to the UK market, including three from Russia⁴. Russian LNG from Yamal supplied approximately 0.4% of UK gas demand in 2018 to date⁴, so even at its peak it was marginal.

The volumes then collapsed. UK LNG imports from Russia fell to just over 5,000 GWh by 2022, an 85% decrease⁹. Policy then closed the door entirely. The British Energy Security Strategy committed to phasing out Russian oil and coal use by the end of 2022, with Russian LNG imports to end as soon as possible thereafter¹⁵. Regulations banning the import and acquisition of LNG from Russia came into force on 1 January 2023³.

The wider separation from Russian gas continues. Ofgem's price cap documentation for mid-2025 records the continued reduction in Russian pipeline gas since January 2025 across the GB and European supply context¹⁶. For British households, the practical significance is that Russian LNG is no longer part of the supply mix behind any bill, and the ban is a legal prohibition rather than a voluntary choice by suppliers.

Storage: a limited cushion beyond the terminals

Import capacity is not the same as security, because gas must be available on the day it is needed, not just on average. GB currently has eight gas storage facilities², a modest buffer for a country of its size. The UK's main gas storage site, the Rough facility in the North Sea, was set to close in 2018⁴, and the 2013 episode, when storage stood at 10% full and a tanker had to be rerouted, showed how thin that buffer can run¹¹. The storage question is examined in detail in UK Gas Storage and Rough: Britain's Largest Gas Storage Site.

The wider storage picture is broader than gas caverns. Existing installed hot water storage capacity in the UK is still around 27GW¹⁷, meaning hot water tanks in homes act as a distributed energy store, and the UK has 2.8GW of pumped hydropower storage, the majority contributed by Ffestiniog and Dinorwig in Wales¹⁸. Neither substitutes for gas storage, but both shape how the system copes when gas supply tightens, because stored hot water and stored electricity can carry some demand through a constrained period.

The independence lesson is that Britain's gas security rests more on import capacity and market flexibility than on stored reserves. A country with deep storage can ride out a cancelled cargo; a country with thin storage must buy its way through, at whatever price prevails that week.

LNG's effect on UK homes' energy security

For an individual home, LNG is the clearest example of energy dependence that no tariff choice can remove. The gas in the pipes is partly domestic, partly Norwegian, partly shipped from Qatar or the US, and the household has no way to choose which. What the household can do is understand the exposure and, where possible, reduce it.

The protections that exist are about supplier failure, not supply failure. The Supplier of Last Resort process applies to both gas and electricity suppliers to residential users in the UK, excluding Northern Ireland¹⁹, so a household is protected if its supplier collapses, even though nothing in that process protects it from a global gas price. Households off the gas grid have their own support route: those using alternative fuels such as heating oil, biomass and LPG received £200 towards their energy costs under the Alternative Fuel Payment from February 2023²⁰. Off-grid LPG heating is expensive in its own right, with bulk propane costing £1,800 to £2,200 a year for a three bed semi-detached house as of March 2026²¹, around 100% more than mains gas for a typical three bedroom house²².

Scotland shows another face of LNG: as a lifeline rather than a global commodity. LNG and LPG play a crucial role in supplying energy to the Scottish Independent Undertakings, the island and remote networks serving Oban, Campbeltown, Wick, Thurso and Stornoway¹⁰. For those communities, shipped gas is local energy security, not exposure.

The industry's own thinking points in one direction. IGEM's 2026 response to the government's gas security consultation urged biomethane integration, gas quality reform and maximising domestic capability before new LNG solutions²³. And the price record explains why: increases in UK gas prices during the energy crisis meant UK prices were temporarily among the most expensive in Europe in the first half of 2023²⁴. A household that reduces gas use, through insulation, a heat pump or stored hot water, shrinks the share of its bill that a cancelled Qatari cargo can move. That is the one lever in this whole chain that sits inside the home. See Energy Security and Household Independence for what a household can actually control.