Cooper, currently LNG Canada’s senior vice president for Phase 1 pipeline and expansion will succeed Jason Klein as president & CEO of LNG Canada, effective April 1, 2025.
Klein, who took over the CEO role in April 2022, will continue to lead LNG Canada until April 1.
After that time, he will return to Shell in Houston, Texas.
LNG Canada said Klein’s next assignment with Shell will be the subject of a future announcement.
According to LNG Canada, Cooper brings over 35 years of experience in the energy sector.
Since joining Shell in 1998, Chris has accrued extensive expertise from his leadership roles in upstream, downstream, and LNG businesses around the world, the JV said.
Cooper was seconded to LNG Canada from Shell in 2021, to lead the reset and completion of the Coastal GasLink pipeline, which recently started commercial operations, in close cooperation with TC Energy.
In tandem with this role, Cooper led LNG Canada’s responsibilities to advance Cedar LNG’s final investment decision (FID) in 2024, while also directing LNG Canada’s Phase 2 development, the JV said.
First cargoes in 2025
LNG Canada confirmed it remains on track to ship first cargoes by the middle of 2025.
One of the largest private investments in Canadian history, LNG Canada is a long-life asset with a 40-year export license that will initially produce 14 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) LNG for export with plans to double its capacity to 28 mtpa with a proposed Phase 2 expansion.
A Phase 2 final investment decision will take into account several factors on behalf of all JVPs, which include over-all competitiveness, affordability, pace, future GHG emissions and stakeholder needs, LNG Canada said.
In October, Shell’s LNG Canada started cooldown activities at its liquefaction and export terminal in Kitimat, as part of the project’s commissioning and start-up phase.
LNG Canada received a cargo of refrigerants (liquefied petroleum gas) onboard the tanker Gaschem Atlantic.
Klein said in September the project was over 95 percent complete.
He noted that LNG Canada introduced natural gas to the facility for the first time, from the new Coastal GasLink pipeline.
He previously said the start-up activities would take more than a year to complete.
Contractor JGC Fluor is constructing the first phase of the giant LNG Canada project that includes two liquefaction trains with a capacity of 14 mtpa.
Besides operator Shell, other partners in the project include Malaysia’s Petronas, PetroChina, Japan’s Mitsubishi Corporation, and South Korea’s Kogas.
