A naming ceremony for two new LNGCs, purpose-built for Poland’s ORLEN Group, was held at the Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries shipyard in Mokpo, South Korea, recently.
The vessels were christened ‘Józef Piłsudski’ and ‘Ignacy Jan Paderewski’.
“We are building Poland’s energy security and independence. We have adopted and are implementing a supply diversification strategy that leverages our own LNG fleet. By next year, it will grow to as many as eight vessels.
“Meanwhile, our expanding portfolio of long-term contracts with US suppliers strengthens our market position and guarantees the stability of deliveries.
“As a result, we can provide Polish customers with reliable sources of gas while also supplying neighbouring markets, including Ukraine, thereby reinforcing energy security across the region,” said Ireneusz Fąfara, ORLEN’s President of the Management Board.
Similar to the company’s other LNGCs, ORLEN has chartered the vessels for 10 years from Knutsen OAS Shipping, with an option to extend the period.
Each LNGC is fitted with an integrated power management system and on board reliquefaction technology, to allow the recovery of boil-off gas (BOG) that naturally evaporates during transportation.
Most of ORLEN’s LNG cargoes are handled at the Świnoujście terminal. To date, 347 deliveries have been received, totalling 27 mill tonnes of LNG.
The largest number of shipments originated from Qatar (154) and the US (167). Other sources included Norway (16), Nigeria (3), Trinidad and Tobago (4), Egypt (2), and Equatorial Guinea (1).
In the first quarter of this year, the company said it planned to receive 20 deliveries at Świnoujście– nine more than during the same period last year.
ORLEN also utilises capacity reserved at the Klaipeda, Lithuania FSRU terminal, at which it has so far received 11 cargoes totalling nearly 740,000 tonnes of LNG.
After regasification, the gas is transported to Poland via the Poland/Lithuania interconnector. Some of the LNG is also supplied to Baltic markets.
The Group is further expanding its domestic LNG import capabilities and has reserved the full regasification capacity – 6.1 bill cu m – of the FLNG terminal currently under construction in the Bay of Gdańsk.
This expansion project will enable ORLEN to increase the number of LNG cargoes received annually by as many as 58 shipments, the company said.
