A federal judge in the 10th District Court in Ensenada, Mexico, has permanently blocked the City of Ensenada from attempting to shut operations at Sempra Energy’s Energia Costa Azul liquefied natural gas (LNG) receiving terminal along the Pacific Coast of North Baja California. Other litigation by an adjacent landowner remains unresolved, although Sempra maintains that it will eventually prevail.

The ruling granted a “permanent suspension” against Ensenada’s municipal government, protecting the Costa Azul facility from any future shutdown attempts, a Sempra LNG spokesperson told NGI.

In response to a Sempra filing earlier this year, a Mexican federal judge in March granted the Sempra LNG facility a second protective order against local government officials and adjacent private landowners who had tried to shut down the terminal.

The action by the federal Mexican court judge June 14 ratified an “interim suspension” order that was granted to Sempra’s LNG facility back in February when City of Ensenada law enforcement personnel swarmed onto the terminal site north of Ensenada (see NGI, Feb. 21).

Sempra drew substantial governmental and business support in Mexico in the wake of the unsuccessful attempt by Ensenada’s new mayor to seize the U.S. energy holding company’s terminal (operations at the facility continued without interruption). At one point, a small group of Mexican Army troops was on the site, and the government kept them in place until it was determined that the facility was secure.

Since that time, the Sempra LNG spokesperson said, the terminal has not experienced “any disruptions in service and it is in full compliance with all laws, rules and regulations in Mexico.”

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