WASHINGTON—This week marks ten years since the first-ever export cargo of US liquefied natural gas (LNG) departed the contiguous United States from a Gulf Coast terminal in Sabine Pass, Louisiana. Made possible by the twenty-first-century shale revolution, this moment was a turning point in the global energy landscape, after which the United States rapidly grew from a net importer of natural gas in the early 2010s to the world’s top exporter by 2022.
In commemorating this milestone, Lithuania’s LNG partnership with the United States stands out as a powerful example of transatlantic cooperation. It demonstrates how expanded US export capacity—combined with strategic infrastructure development, resolute energy-sector reform, and sufficient political will in Europe—can produce real alternatives to Russian gas. Once regarded as an isolated “energy island” on the Baltic Sea, Lithuania today has reshaped the regional energy landscape in Central and Eastern Europe by becoming a key gateway for US LNG imports in markets spanning Finland to Ukraine.
Today, Lithuania imports more than three-quarters of its LNG from the United States, helping bolster Vilnius’s status as a “model ally” to Washington. The rest of Lithuania’s imports come from Norway and some other smaller suppliers, allowing the country to preserve flexibility amid any potential fluctuations in the global LNG market. As Hungary and Slovakia attempt to disrupt European Union (EU) plans to phase out Russian gas by 2027, Lithuania’s experience directly challenges their claims that geography or historical dependence leave certain countries with “no alternatives” to Russian supply.