UK's Barrow gas terminal outage extended until July 23

London — Unplanned maintenance at the UK's Barrow natural gas terminal has been extended until July 23, operator Spirit Energy said in a market transparency update July 8.

The prolongation means that full terminal capacity of 7.7 million cu m/d will remain offline until then, as has been the case since the outage's June 11 onset.

The update included greater detail on the precise nature of the issue, specifying a "technical process issue," caused by "FGC LP Compressor shaft damage."

The Barrow terminal has been beset with non-specific process issues for some time, although it enjoyed nearly uninterrupted operation in the second quarter until the present issue struck.

"It is damage to a component on the main gas compressor ... it's not part of a recurring issue," a spokesman for Spirit Energy told S&P Global Platts separately, distancing current problems from past outages.

At the beginning of June, Spirit declared a planned maintenance window for a "technical process issue" between July 3-13.

Barrow is next scheduled to undergo planned annual maintenance between August 31-September 21, which will also render the full terminal capacity unavailable.

Spirit assumed operatorship of the terminal in 2019 from Centrica, which had previously reported frequent technical process problems within its gas processing plant.