Shares in Centrica, the FTSE 100 owner of British Gas, have jumped after it joined forces with Energy Capital Partners (ECP) to snap up Europe’s largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal for £1.5bn

In a statement issued to the London Stock Exchange, Centrica hailed its bumper acquisition of the National Grid’s Grain LNG, which stores and processes natural gas at its site in Kent, as helping “support the UK’s energy security for many decades to come”.

LNG is playing an increasingly important role in the UK’s energy grid as the country seeks to transition away from more carbon intensive hydrocarbons to a mix of gas, renewables and nuclear power.

Shares in the owner of British Gas rose by three per cent in early trades before falling back to just over two per cent.

The fuel, which is a type of natural gas that is cooled to a liquid to make it easier to transport and store, is predicted to meet just shy of 60 per cent of the UK’s total gas demand by 2050, up from its current share of 15 per cent. The Grain facility is expected to meet a third of the UK’s future demand.

Centrica and ECP, which is part of US buyout giant Bridgepoint, will each own a 50 per cent stake of the site, worth £200m each, after the deal, which also involved £1.1bn of project finance debt.

The acquisition is further evidence of the new direction in which Centrica boss Chris O’Shea is taking the UK’s largest listed energy provider, after it also became one of the private backers of the UK’s Sizewell C nuclear power plant.