The Petronas-backed consortium behind LNG Canada is weighing an expansion of its export complex at Kitimat, British Columbia, with a reported price tag of RM86 billion, according to a report carried by KLSE Screener.

The figure marks the second major capital commitment attached to the West Coast liquefaction hub in under a decade. The original Phase 1 development — a two-train, 14 million tonne per annum facility built by a partnership including Petronas through its North American unit, Shell, PetroChina, Mitsubishi and Korea Gas Corporation — remains the largest private-sector energy investment in Canadian history.

Details of the expansion plan remain thin. The KLSE Screener report did not specify whether the RM86 billion figure covers a full Phase 2 build-out, additional trains beyond the two already sanctioned, or associated upstream and midstream spending across the Montney and other Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin supply corridors.

What the number does signal is intent. An expansion study at Kitimat would extend the facility's runway at a moment when North American liquefaction capacity is racing to meet contracted demand from Asian buyers, the primary market for cargoes shipped from the BC coast.

For Petronas, a sanctioned second phase would deepen a Canadian position the Malaysian national oil company has held since it abandoned its own standalone Pacific NorthWest LNG project near Prince Rupert in 2016 and consolidated into the LNG Canada partnership instead. Petronas holds a 25 percent stake in the venture.

The expansion report lands as Phase 1 moves through its commissioning sequence. First cargo timing has slipped repeatedly since the project was sanctioned in 2016, with startup now tracked for 2025 after cost pressures and site disruptions added years to the schedule.

A Phase 2 sanction at Kitimat would carry significant knock-on effects for Canadian gas producers. The facility draws its feedstock from British Columbia and Alberta via Coastal GasLink, the 670-kilometre pipeline that connects the plant to the WCSB. Additional trains would pull incremental volumes through an already-congested egress system and tighten basis differentials for AECO-linked supply.

It would also sharpen competition with the US Gulf Coast liquefaction corridor, where a wave of new capacity is under construction, and with Mexico's emerging Pacific Coast export plans, all chasing the same Asia-Pacific demand pool.

The report did not indicate whether the partners have committed capital, set a sanction timeline, or filed for the additional regulatory approvals a second phase would require. Any expansion beyond the currently permitted footprint would need amended permits from the BC Energy Regulator and the Canada Energy Regulator, a process that took years for the initial development.

No company statement confirming the RM86 billion figure was included in the report, and Petronas has not commented publicly on the scope or timing of the proposed expansion.

For equity markets tracking Petronas and its partners, the watch items are straightforward: confirmation of the expansion cost estimate from the venture itself, any formal sanction decision by the joint-venture partners, and the regulatory filing pathway in British Columbia. The first cargo from Phase 1 remains the nearer-term milestone.