The German Government is looking to sub-charter out some of its FSRU terminals, following disputes and planning incidents that have resulted in two contract cancellations in recent months.
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“Talks are ongoing with potential interested parties to sub-rent the ships, if we don’t need them anymore,” a spokesperson for the German economy ministry said at a government press conference last Friday.
“It was never set in stone that we definitely would use these ships for 10 years,” she claimed, referring to the contract when they were first chartered in 2022.
While Germany’s rapid construction of LNG terminals in the aftermath of the energy crisis is often touted as a rare engineering feat in the face of staggering bureaucracy, the problems faced recently with two FSRUs that were taken in signal the rollout hadn’t been easy, Bloomberg reported.
The latest dispute involves the Stade LNG terminal near Hamburg, where the state-owned operator, Deutsche Energy Terminal (DET) and the project developer, Hanseatic Energy Hub (HEH) have accused each other of failing to fulfill contractual obligations.
DET said it had terminated the contract with HEH. The project was still under construction and hasn’t received LNG thus far.
It’s the second dispute in two months after one of the two FSRUs operating by Deutsche ReGas at Mukran on the island of Ruegen had its charter contract cancelled with DET over pricing.
The FSRU ‘Energos Force’, has been moved to an anchorage off Skagen, Denmark and is believed to be the subject of a charter bid from Egypt.
Across Europe, several LNG terminals that were set up quickly after the energy crisis have faced difficulties, due to their high operating costs.
France’s latest LNG terminal, located at Le Havre and commissioned by TotalEnergies in 2023, hasn’t received any cargoes since last June, despite high gas demand in the region, Bloomberg claimed.
