A U.S. manufacturing trade group on March 1 urged the U.S. Department of Energy not to approve further LNG export applications, citing concerns that the country was consuming and exporting the fuel at a faster clip than it was finding new resources.

The agency’s approval of LNG export volumes equal almost 70% of 2016 U.S. demand for periods of 20 to 30 years, which cannot possibly be in the “public interest,” the Industrial Energy Consumers Of America (IECA) said.

Concerns about LNG exports and the impacts on supply and prices were expressed at the recent ADI Forum by Mark Darnell, senior energy manager at Air Liquide.

After decades of importing massive amounts of natural gas, the United States became an exporter of the fuel in 2017 for the first time in 60 years due in part to growing LNG exports.

The United States is expected to become the third-biggest LNG exporter by capacity in 2018. At the start of 2016 before Cheniere Energy Inc.’s (NYSE MKTS: LNG) Sabine Pass LNG export terminal entered service in February of that year, the United States was not exporting LNG.

Sabine Pass has been the only LNG export facility operating in the country, although a vessel laden with LNG left Dominion's Cove Point, Md., export terminal on March 2. By the end of the year, the nation’s LNG export capacity is expected to rise from 3 billion cubic feet (Bcf/d) now to 4.6 Bcf/d.

One Bcf/d is enough gas to fuel about 5 million U.S. homes.

Over the next few years, the nation’s LNG export capacity is expected to rise to 9.4 Bcf/d by the end of 2019 and 10.1 Bcf/d by the end of 2020 as facilities currently under construction enter service.

In addition, there are dozens of projects under development that hope to get contracts from customers so they can also get built. It is these projects that the manufacturing trade group is targeting.

The companies developing new LNG projects include units of Cheniere, Tellurian Inc., Energy Transfer Partners LP, Exxon Mobil Corp, Pembina Pipeline Corp, Liquefied Natural Gas Ltd, Kinder Morgan Inc. and Sempra Energy.