June 14 (Reuters) - New Fortress Energy said on Friday it expects to start production of liquefied natural gas at its offshore Altamira-based plant in Mexico in the next ten days and would begin shipping the gas in July.

The pre-operations and remaining commissioning activities have been completed, New Fortress said.

The U.S. LNG producer's Altamira plant is Mexico's first such facility and has been delayed several times.

In May, the company said it expected to export the first cargo in June. The production deadlines were missed in September and December last year, as well as in February this year.

Earlier, the company had said the first LNG train, the liquefaction unit, would cost about $1 billion. (Reporting by Arunima Kumar in Bengaluru; Editing by Mohammed Safi Shamsi)