The Department of Energy's Hydrocarbons and Geothermal Energy Office granted Argent LNG, LLC long-term authorization on July 23 to export liquefied natural gas (LNG) to free trade agreement nations from a proposed terminal at Port Fourchon in Lafourche Parish, Louisiana. Buried in the order's background section is a detail with implications beyond this single project: Baker Hughes Energy Services LLC owns a 5% equity interest in Argent LNG HoldCo LLC, the Delaware entity that controls Argent LNG. The remaining controlling interest sits with Argent LNG Holdings LLC, whose sole member is Jonathan Bass.
The order authorizes Argent LNG to export a volume equivalent to 1,293.75 billion cubic feet per year of natural gas, or approximately 25 million metric tons per annum of LNG, for a 20-year term plus a three-year make-up period. This portion of the approval covers only exports to nations with a free trade agreement with the United States; a separate DOE review is still pending for exports to non-FTA countries, and the project still needs Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) authorization to site, construct, and operate the terminal itself. Argent LNG anticipates starting construction in December 2027, with service beginning in the first quarter of 2030.
What the Project Would Include
As described in the DOE filing, the roughly 900-acre Port Fourchon site would house pre-treatment facilities, 12 modular liquefaction units, two 220,000-cubic-meter full-containment LNG storage tanks, a 350-megawatt simple-cycle gas turbine power generation facility, and two marine loading berths able to accommodate LNG carriers ranging from 125,000 to 260,000 cubic meters. Argent LNG has not yet signed binding long-term supply contracts, though it has a non-binding heads of agreement with the Government of Bangladesh for up to 5 million metric tons per annum and a cooperation agreement with Turkiye's gas and electricity exchange, with additional discussions underway across Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia, and Latin America.
A Pattern Beyond a Single Project
Baker Hughes' position in Argent LNG is not an isolated data point. Baker Hughes took a similar step on the Alaska LNG project, where it supplies refrigerant compressors and power generation equipment while also committing capital as a project investor rather than acting purely as a vendor. Combined with its pending $13.6 billion acquisition of Chart Industries, a deal the company has said deepens its position across LNG, hydrogen, and data center infrastructure, the Argent LNG stake reads less like an isolated bet and more like a deliberate shift from equipment sales toward direct ownership stakes in the projects that use that equipment.
The rationale is straightforward from a supplier's perspective. An equity stake gives an equipment provider earlier visibility into engineering decisions, a longer-term claim on service and maintenance revenue across a facility's operating life, and a stronger negotiating position on future orders than a one-time equipment sale would provide. For developers, bringing a strategic supplier into the ownership structure can help absorb some of the execution risk that has slowed LNG projects industry-wide, the same equipment and engineering queues already shaping the pace of other U.S. LNG expansions moving through DOE and FERC review.
Argent LNG's 5% arrangement with Baker Hughes is a minority position, and the DOE order does not detail what role, if any, Baker Hughes will play beyond its equity interest. But paired with the Alaska LNG precedent, it points to a broader question for developers and financiers evaluating the next wave of LNG projects: whether bringing an equipment supplier in as an owner, not just a vendor, is becoming a standard tool for de-risking multibillion-dollar terminal construction.
