Argentina LNG's three founding partners will pitch the $51 billion export project to European investors in Paris this week as it nears a final investment decision (FID).
Horacio Marín, chairman and CEO of YPF, Argentina's state-controlled oil and gas company, will share the LNG panel with Sultan Al Jaber, CEO of ADNOC, Abu Dhabi's state oil company, and the UAE's Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology, and Claudio Descalzi, CEO of ENI, the Italian energy company.
The session, set for 9:50 a.m. Paris time (4:50 a.m. in Argentina) on Thursday, Oct. 1, is the centerpiece of the agenda. The three executives are not courtesy guests: the official program presents their project as the largest investment in Argentina's history.
The panel anchors the second edition of Argentina Week, the investor roadshow the Milei administration launched in New York in March. The Paris edition runs from Sept. 30 to Oct. 2 and is organized by the Argentine Embassy in France and the Office of the President, unlike the New York event, which JP Morgan and Bank of America co-hosted.
Its main stage is the headquarters of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), where President Javier Milei will lead a delegation including Economy Minister Luis Caputo, Central Bank Governor Santiago Bausili, Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno and Deregulation Minister Federico Sturzenegger, alongside provincial governors and senior global executives.
A Project With Its Hardware Defined
Argentina LNG targets initial capacity of 12 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) through two floating LNG units (FLNG) of 6 MTPA each, moored off the coast of Rio Negro province, with technical headroom to scale to 18 MTPA. The scheme integrates the full chain: production in Vaca Muerta, treatment, transport and export.
The project arriving in Paris is considerably more mature than the one first announced. In February, YPF, ENI and XRG, ADNOC's international investment arm, signed a binding joint development agreement (JDA) that opened the front-end engineering and design (FEED) phase.
In June, the partners defined the upstream: ENI and XRG will each take 32% and YPF will retain 36% of UPCO ARLNG I, the company holding the Meseta Buena Esperanza I and II, Aguada Villanueva Norte and Las Tacanas I and II blocks, with the transfer subject to regulatory approval. A second vehicle, MIDCO, followed, grouping the midstream assets so the project can raise debt on a track separate from drilling.
The most visible construction package is also awarded. A consortium of Pumpco, part of U.S. contractor MasTec; Bonatti, the Italian pipeline contractor; and Argentina's Contreras Hermanos won the contract with a bid of about $1.2 billion to build two parallel 527-kilometer lines between Neuquen and Sierra Grande, Rio Negro province: a 48-inch trunk gas pipeline, the largest diameter in Argentina, and a 24-inch liquids line.
The trunk line will be able to move 75–100 MMm³/d, a scale comparable to Neuquen province's current gas output, while the two first-phase FLNG units need about 49 MMm³/d. The difference is, in effect, the physical capacity reserved for expansion to 18 MTPA. The Tecnimont-SACDE joint venture has also been preselected to build the primary separation plant, for $2.5 billion to $3 billion.
EXIM, JP Morgan and a $51 Billion Tally
YPF estimates Argentina LNG will require $51 billion over its lifetime and about $29 billion through 2031, of which roughly $24 billion will go to pipelines, port facilities, processing plants and liquefaction units. JP Morgan is structuring the financing as lead bank.
Marín arrives with fresh news. On Sept. 23 in New York, Quirno and U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau launched the Andes-Atlantic Corridor, and within that framework the U.S. Export-Import Bank (EXIM Bank) issued a non-binding indicative term sheet for up to $6 billion for Argentina LNG, tied to purchases of U.S. goods and services. For that offer to become a loan, the date that matters is FID, which the partners have committed for the second half of 2026.
That is the underlying purpose of the Paris stop. With U.S. financing on track and partners from the Middle East and Europe already on board, the OECD panel serves as a showcase for banks, export credit agencies and European buyers in the final stretch before the investment decision.
One detail stands out: the agreement YPF signed with Neuquen province in June, which cuts the royalties the province collects on the project's gas, exempts it from the provincial gross receipts tax and grants it fiscal stability, names arbitration at the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in Paris, one of Argentina Week's own venues, as its dispute resolution mechanism.
Birol, Pouyanné and Argentina's Gas Map
The panel will follow a presentation by Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA), who will outline Argentina's opportunity in the context of the World Energy Outlook. In a market disrupted by the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea, the IEA's reading of Atlantic LNG supply will frame YPF's pitch: a distant but stable supplier whose export routes bypass both chokepoints.
Patrick Pouyanné, CEO of TotalEnergies, the French energy major, will then deliver a special address. TotalEnergies is not part of Argentina LNG, though it is a long-standing player in the Neuquen Basin. With 18 MTPA of potential capacity, a pipeline sized for growth and the space left by Shell, which exited the project in December 2025 after taking part only in pre-FEED work, any signal from Pouyanné will be closely watched.
The second energy block widens the lens. Marcos Bulgheroni, group CEO of Pan American Energy (PAE), Argentina's largest private oil producer, and Egbert Laege, CEO of SEFE Securing Energy for Europe, the German state-owned gas company, will discuss Argentine gas in the global market. The pairing has concrete history: SEFE is the first buyer of Argentine LNG, under a binding eight-year sale and purchase agreement (SPA) signed in March for 2 MTPA on a free on board (FOB) basis from late 2027 with Southern Energy.
The PAE-led consortium, whose partners also include YPF, Pampa Energía, Harbour Energy and Golar LNG, will launch Argentina's first LNG exports with the Hilli Episeyo and MKII FLNG units. Governors Rolando Figueroa of Neuquen and Alberto Weretilneck of Rio Negro complete the picture from both ends of the chain: the province that supplies the gas and the one that hosts the export coast.
The block closes with another way to monetize Vaca Muerta. Marcelo Mindlin, chairman of Pampa Energía, a diversified Argentine energy company, and Fabrizio Di Amato, chairman of Maire, the Italian engineering group that controls Tecnimont, will present Fértil Pampa, a $2.7 billion granular urea complex in Bahia Blanca, Buenos Aires province, Argentina's main industrial port.
The plant will produce 6,000 tonnes per day, equivalent to 2.1 million tonnes per year. Pampa's board approved FID on July 17, and the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract with Tecnimont-SACDE was signed the same day. The same molecule, converted into fertilizer instead of liquefied, opens another export outlet.
Mining, Agribusiness and Geopolitics
Mining gets its own session with French and global capital. Christel Bories, chair and interim CEO of French mining group Eramet, will speak on the Centenario lithium project in Salta province; Jérôme Pécresse, CEO of Rio Tinto Aluminium & Lithium, will detail progress at Rincon, Fenix, Sal de Vida and Olaroz; and Gary Nagle, CEO of Glencore, will focus on the MARA and El Pachon copper projects.
The rest of the agenda covers three fronts:
- Agribusiness, consumer goods and health: Mariano Bosch (Adecoagro), Antoine de Saint-Affrique (Danone), Michael Gelchie (Louis Dreyfus), Mustafa Terrab (OCP) and Alejandro Elsztain (Cresud); in retail, Manuel Antelo (Grupo Antelo) and Sabine Mulliez (Groupe Mulliez); and in health, Mario Lugones, Jörg-Michael Rupp (Roche International), Juan Pablo Bagó and Sanofi representatives.
- Geopolitics and finance: Mathias Cormann (OECD), John Denton (ICC), Héctor Grisi (Santander), Martín Migoya (Globant) and Martín Varsavsky (Inception Fertility), with closing remarks from Quirno and Sturzenegger.
- Friday, Oct. 2 thematic agenda: sessions at several Paris venues on technology and artificial intelligence, energy, critical minerals and the nuclear sector at the IEA; the Mercosur-European Union agreement at the ICC; fisheries business rounds; and a Paris Economic Forum award to Milei at the Automobile Club de France.
Three days, seven venues and a long list of speakers. The picture markets will retain, however, is Marín, Al Jaber and Descalzi on the same stage. When they next share a table, the expectation is that they will be signing the FID.