FERC proposes its first blanket authorization program for LNG plants

Serguey Asael Shinder17 October 2026, 08:432 min read

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission proposed on 15 October 2026, in a unanimous vote, an LNG blanket authorization program for liquefied natural gas facilities. In a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NOPR), FERC would let eligible activities at LNG plants proceed without case-specific authorization orders under Sections 3 and 7 of the Natural Gas Act. The Commission says the program is modelled on its 40-year blanket certificate program for interstate natural gas pipelines.

The three tiers. The proposed framework sorts activities by how far they stretch a plant's authorized envelope:

• Automatic authorization, with periodic reporting, for activities that would not increase the plant's authorized capacity, expand its authorized vertical or horizontal extents within the footprint, or push flows, levels, volumes, pressures, temperatures, compositions or loads past applicable design limits;
• 60-day prior notice for activities that may increase authorized capacity but stay within the footprint and within the design limits of the affected or remaining facilities;
• 90-day prior notice for construction of new LNG facilities — liquefaction trains, LNG tanks and marine berths — and related auxiliary systems, including those outside the footprint, subject to limits on facility type, location and size.

Safeguards and process. The NOPR also proposes standard environmental and engineering design conditions for projects approved under the program, plus other requirements to ensure compliance with applicable laws. Interested parties have 60 days after publication in the Federal Register to comment. Chairman Laura V. Swett framed the proposal around "American energy dominance" and building infrastructure "without unnecessary delay".

This is a proposal, not a rule: it has to go through notice and comment before anything is finalised, and FERC's framing is its own. What is concrete is the mechanism (a blanket program under NGA Sections 3 and 7), the three tiers and their thresholds, and the 60-day comment window. It is one of two gas-review reforms FERC advanced at the same meeting; the other rewrites how it analyses air quality under NEPA.

Source: FERC, "FERC Takes Historic Action Launching First LNG Authorization Program" — https://www.ferc.gov/news-events/news/ferc-takes-historic-action-launching-first-lng-authorization-program