ABA Editorial · Mar 14, 2026 · 15 min read
African natural gas projects represent the largest fossil fuel investments being made on the continent in the 2020s. Mozambique LNG, Tanzania LNG, the Greater Tortue Ahmeyim project on the Senegal-Mauritania border, and Egyptian LNG export capacity together represent over USD 100 billion in planned and committed capital. The transition question, whether African gas is a bridge fuel or a stranded asset, is the defining strategic debate of the category. This report maps the current state.
Africa's natural gas sector in 2026 sits at the center of one of the most politically charged energy debates in the world. The continent holds significant proven gas reserves, multiple large-scale liquefied natural gas (LNG) export projects are under various stages of construction or production, and several African governments have explicitly framed gas development as the foundation of their economic development strategies. At the same time, climate advocates and some international financiers argue that new gas infrastructure is incompatible with net-zero commitments and that African gas projects may become stranded assets before their capital is recovered. Both arguments matter, and the commercial reality sits somewhere between them. This report maps the current state of the major African gas projects, the investment scale involved, and the transition questions that will determine the sector's trajectory.
African proven natural gas reserves are geographically concentrated. Algeria, Egypt, Libya, and Nigeria have historically held the majority of continental reserves, with each country having produced and exported gas for decades. The more recent story is about the East and Southeast African discoveries, particularly in Mozambique (the Rovuma Basin offshore gas discoveries that began in 2010) and Tanzania (the adjacent deepwater discoveries along the same basin), and the West African discoveries along the Senegal-Mauritania maritime boundary that have created the Greater Tortue Ahmeyim project. These newer discoveries have roughly doubled Africa's estimated gas export potential and shifted the center of gravity of African LNG development away from the historical producers toward countries that had no significant gas export history.
Mozambique's Rovuma Basin gas resources are estimated at over 180 trillion cubic feet across multiple discovery areas, which makes Mozambique one of the largest gas discoveries of the 21st century globally. The commercial development of these resources has been complicated. The Mozambique LNG project, led by TotalEnergies with partners including Mitsui, ONGC Videsh, and others, was designed to produce approximately 13.1 million tonnes per annum of LNG from onshore liquefaction trains receiving gas from offshore fields. The project reached final investment decision in 2019 with total project costs estimated at approximately USD 20 billion, which would make it one of the largest single foreign direct investments ever made in Africa.
In 2021, TotalEnergies declared force majeure on the project and evacuated staff following an Islamic State-linked insurgent attack on the nearby town of Palma that killed dozens of people and disrupted the security environment around the construction site. The project has been in a complex restart process in the years since, with security conditions gradually stabilizing through 2024 and 2025 as Rwandan and Mozambican forces established control over the northern Cabo Delgado region. Restart timelines have been announced and revised multiple times, and as of early 2026 the project remained in preparation for resumption rather than in active construction. Separately, the Eni-led Coral South Floating LNG project, a smaller 3.4 million tonne per annum facility, began production earlier and has been operating throughout the security crisis that affected the larger onshore project.
Mozambique's gas strategy depends on these projects reaching production at meaningful scale. The government has structured its energy transition planning, fiscal revenue expectations, and foreign exchange management around LNG export revenues that will only materialize if the projects come online as planned. Delays accumulate both in the project schedules and in the macroeconomic assumptions built around them.
The Greater Tortue Ahmeyim field straddles the maritime boundary between Senegal and Mauritania and is being developed jointly by the two governments under a unique cross-border treaty framework. The project is led by BP as operator, with Kosmos Energy, Petrosen (Senegal's national oil company), and SMH (Mauritania's national oil company) as partners. The first phase of GTA uses a floating LNG facility anchored offshore to liquefy gas for export, with initial production capacity of approximately 2.3 million tonnes per annum.
First gas flow and initial LNG production from GTA Phase 1 reached milestones through 2024 and 2025, making GTA one of the most significant new LNG production additions for Africa in the decade. Subsequent phases are under planning to expand capacity, potentially including onshore liquefaction infrastructure that would support much larger production volumes. For Senegal and Mauritania, GTA represents the first significant hydrocarbon export revenue streams and has reshaped the macroeconomic outlook for both countries. The cross-border cooperation model has also attracted attention as a potential template for other African offshore discoveries that straddle maritime boundaries.
Egypt holds the largest existing African LNG export infrastructure, with liquefaction facilities at Damietta and Idku that were built in the 2000s. Egypt's gas export strategy has fluctuated significantly over the last decade. Through the mid-2010s the country was a net gas importer as domestic demand outpaced production. Following the major Zohr offshore discovery in 2015 (estimated at approximately 30 trillion cubic feet of gas in place), Egypt was able to restart LNG exports and even briefly position itself as a regional gas hub serving European markets.
The post-2022 European energy crisis created additional demand for Egyptian LNG exports as European buyers looked for alternatives to Russian pipeline gas. Egypt's proximity to European markets, existing liquefaction infrastructure, and growing upstream production made it an immediate beneficiary of the dynamic. Through 2024 and 2025, however, Egyptian gas export volumes have been constrained by rising domestic demand driven by power sector gas consumption, and by the challenge of balancing export revenue generation against domestic electricity supply needs during summer peak seasons. The tension between exports and domestic supply is a recurring feature of Egyptian gas policy and is unlikely to resolve without substantial additional upstream investment.
Tanzania's Rovuma Basin gas discoveries, adjacent to Mozambique's on the same regional geology, are large enough to support a world-scale LNG export project but the commercial development has lagged Mozambique by several years. The Tanzania LNG project is led by Equinor and Shell in partnership with the Tanzanian government. Host government agreement negotiations between the project sponsors and the government have been ongoing for years and reached an important milestone with the signing of a Host Government Agreement, but final investment decision has not yet been taken as of early 2026. The project, if it proceeds, would produce approximately 10 million tonnes per annum from onshore liquefaction facilities in Lindi.
Tanzania's energy transition framing has generally supported gas development as a bridge fuel that would finance the country's broader economic development and renewable energy ambitions. Whether the Tanzania LNG project reaches final investment decision in the near term will depend on commercial terms, global LNG market conditions, and the project sponsors' assessment of long-term demand for new African gas production.
The debate over whether new African gas infrastructure is a bridge or a stranded asset is genuinely contested. Proponents argue that gas displaces dirtier fuels (coal, diesel, biomass) in African power generation, that gas export revenues finance development, and that African countries have both the right and the need to monetize their hydrocarbon resources the way earlier-developing economies did. Critics argue that new gas infrastructure locks in emissions for 20 to 40 year project lifetimes at a moment when the global energy system needs to transition away from fossil fuels, that the 2020s LNG supply wave may create structural oversupply that leaves new African projects uncompetitive against existing global producers, and that the capital invested in gas projects would be more valuable if deployed to African renewable infrastructure instead.
Both arguments are partially correct. African gas projects are unlikely to all succeed commercially at their original scale, but some will. The ones that reach production early in competitive cost positions (GTA, Mozambique Coral South FLNG, Egyptian existing facilities) are most likely to recover their capital before transition pressures intensify. The ones that reach final investment decision late, with higher cost structures, face greater stranding risk.
Three developments will shape the African gas story over the next year. First, whether Mozambique LNG restart proceeds on the latest announced timeline or faces further delays. Second, whether Tanzania LNG reaches final investment decision, which would signal that project sponsors still see commercial logic in new world-scale African gas infrastructure. Third, whether global LNG market conditions support or undermine the financial case for late-stage African gas projects, which depends on European, Asian, and emerging market gas demand trajectories that are outside any African government's control. The African gas story is being written at the intersection of African development priorities, global energy market dynamics, and climate policy, and the chapters that emerge through 2026 and 2027 will shape what the continent's energy mix looks like well into the 2040s.