HOUSTON, March 14 (Reuters) - Liquefied natural gas

(LNG) exporter Venture Global LNG on Thursday delivered to U.S.

regulators a proposed protective order seeking to keep documents

on the construction of a Louisiana export facility confidential.

The request will test the Federal Energy Regulatory

Commission's (FERC) willingness to back a call by Venture Global

LNG's customers to require the company to disclose details on

the plant's startup and repairs.

Venture Global has said it would not make the

information available

unless ordered to do so

.

FERC had given Venture Global five days to provide the

proposed order that sets out a process for any use of its

privileged information.

Customers, including BP, Shell, Edison

, Repsol, Galp, Unipec and Orlen ( PSKOF )

, filed with the regulator to comment on the extension,

or objected to the lack of access to the documents, saying they

could not evaluate its request without viewing them.

They have in the past accused Venture Global of

selling billions of dollars of LNG

since 2022 that should have been supplied under long-term

contracts to them.

The Arlington, Virginia-based company has exported 257

pre-commercial cargoes at prices well above the rates that other

exporters charged, Shell said in its request to deny the

extension.

The company sold its LNG at an average of $48.8 million

per cargo, or $29 million more per cargo than if the LNG was

sold at the average of other U.S. exporters' prices, Shell

estimated, using U.S. Department of Energy data.

Venture Global said in the past none of the companies

had requested access to any confidential filings on its

Calcasieu Pass facility, and it had not been required to provide

a protective order.

"As Calcasieu Pass will explain in a separate filing, it

opposes those requests," it told the commission.