TotalEnergies has assured the National Government that the Final Investment Decision (FID) for the Papua LNG project will be announced this year, 2026.
Prime Minister Hon. James Marape revealed this morning at Melanesian House following his return from a bilateral visit with French President Emmanuel Macron last week.
In step with this timeline, the State is actively processing the Development Forum, which is scheduled to commence between late June and early July 2026 to mobilize local landowners, the Gulf Provincial Government, and Central Province.
Prime Minister Marape confirmed he met directly with TotalEnergies CEO Patrick Pouyanne, who affirmed that Papua LNG remains a priority project that will not be abandoned.
The Prime Minister urged the project’s joint-venture partners—TotalEnergies, ExxonMobil, and Santos—to resolve internal differences and present a single, unified position to the State to ensure the 2026 deadline is met.
While acknowledging that Papua LNG is a 6.6 trillion Cubic Feet (TCF) project— significantly smaller than the 80 TCF projects TotalEnergies and ExxonMobil operate in Mozambique—Prime Minister Marape emphasized its critical im- portance to Papua New Guinea.
The project has undergone vital cost restructuring to ensure commercial viability. Initial tender was evaluated at $18 billion which was deemed financially unfeasible by TotalEnergies with a revision made and brought down to approximately $14 billion through a secondary bidding process.
Prime Minister Marape said although the State has rejected requests for free incentives or concessions to maintain a strict “give-and-take” approach to better protect State share in the project, it was willing to offer technical assistance.
The Prime Minister reassured the public that the core structure of the gas agreement signed in 2019 remains completely unchanged despite market disruptions brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.
The initial Papua LNG Gas Agreement was executed in April 2019 under the O’Neill government. Upon taking office in late May 2019, the Marape-Steven government initiated a review of the terms to maximize national benefits. Following intense negotiations with TotalEnergies to secure better returns for local landowners and provincial governments, the State validated the agreement in late 2019 with its core structural frameworks intact. “The project is still a go-ahead from Total’s perspective,” Prime Minister Marape stated. “But I did remind them that time is ticking, and they are time-bound to deliver this project. They are sorting out cost issues and will come to us as soon as this is done.”