Government lifts gas rationing after recovering Cartagena terminal

The Ministry of Mines and Energy declared the cessation of the Scheduled Natural Gas Rationing as of 23:59 hours on September 29, 2026, according to Resolution 40538 of 2026, published in the Official Gazette number 53,670 on Monday, October 26, 2026. The measure was adopted once the regasification terminal in Cartagena recovered its total capacity of 475 MMSCFD, a condition that had prompted the declaration of rationing one month prior.

The act, signed by Minister María Nohemí Arboleda Arango, repeals Resolution 40524 of 2026 of September 25, which had declared the start of scheduled rationing across all national production natural gas supply sources and regasification infrastructures. That regulation was intended to remain in effect until the Sociedad Portuaria El Cayao S.A. E.S.P. - SPEC LNG, in its capacity as the infrastructure agent, communicated that the originating causes had been overcome; at that moment, it was the Ministry’s responsibility to declare the cessation, pursuant to the paragraph of article 2.2.2.2.4 of Decree 1073 of 2015.

The invoked framework includes article 365 of the Political Constitution, articles 1, 2, and 4 of Law 142 of 1994, and article 16 of Law 401 of 1997, which empowers the Government to establish the priority order of service in the event of insurmountable restrictions in the gas supply.

The incident that originated the emergency

On September 23, 2026, near midnight, SPEC LNG detected an operational condition in one of the regasification trains of the floating storage regasification unit (FSRU) in Cartagena, which required immediate intervention and corrective activities. As a consequence, the terminal operated temporarily with a capacity of up to 400 MMSCFD, compared to the total capacity of 475 MMSCFD.

According to Resolution 40524 of 2026, this reduction generated a restriction on the essential demand contracted with imported gas, estimated by agents at 15 GBTUD. Based on this, the ministry declared the scheduled rationing and established a priority order of service that placed essential demand first, followed by non-essential demand, including thermal generation.

The sequence that led to the cessation

The recitals of Resolution 40538 of 2026 reconstruct the path to the exit in four steps:

• The document with filing number 1-2026-047610 dated September 29, 2026, in which SPEC LNG reported that corrective activities ended at 10:36 hours that day and that the terminal had available regasification capacity of up to 475 MMSCFD.
• The communication with filing number 1-2026-047607 dated September 29, 2026, through which the National Gas Operation Council (CNO Gas) confirmed to the Ministry that the operational condition had been overcome and recommended restoring ordinary market conditions.
• The analysis by the Hydrocarbons Directorate, which recommended declaring the end of the scheduled rationing.
• The publication of the draft on the Ministry’s website on September 29, 2026, for a period of one hour, in compliance with numeral 8 of article 8 of Law 1437 of 2011.

The act was issued without the competency advocacy process before the Superintendency of Industry and Commerce, based on numeral 1.1 of article 2.2.2.30.4 of Decree 1074 of 2015, which exempts cases arising from unforeseeable or irresistible events intended to preserve the stability of a sector.

What changes for the market and users

The first article sets the cessation at 23:59 hours on September 29, 2026. The second article provides that from that time, the effects of Resolution 40524 of 2026 cease and the prioritization and demand fulfillment measures adopted on the occasion of the rationing are no longer applicable, whereby the ordinary operating conditions provided for in the current regulation are restored.

In practice, the allocation of volumes ceases to be governed by the emergency order of precedence—essential demand, non-essential demand, firm agreed exports—and returns to the ordinary contractual scheme of the market. The third article expressly repeals Resolution 40524 of 2026 and the fourth orders its publication in the Official Gazette.

For industrial and residential users, the change implies the end of the exceptional gas reallocation rules that governed during the contingency, although the publication of the act in the Official Gazette occurred nearly four weeks after the date on which the measure began to take effect.

Source: Official Gazette, Edition 53,670, Monday, October 26, 2026, Section I (Ministry of Mines and Energy), p. 15 (official reference: Resolution number 40538 of 2026).