LNG

Mozambique President Filipe Jacinto Nyusi has visited and inaugurated the “Coral-Sul FLNG” installation located in the ultra-deep waters of the Rovuma Basin that has turned his southeast African nation into an LNG exporter.

The inauguration ceremony was also attended by the Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy Carlos Zacarias and by other representatives of Mozambique’s government.

They were accompanied by a delegation from the resources operator, the Italian energy company Eni and led by Guido Brusco, Chief Operating Officer of Natural Resources at the Milan-based company.

The event took place 10 days after the first LNG cargo was lifted on 13 November from the “Coral Sul FLNG” vessel.

“Coral Sul is a landmark project for the gas industry and is projecting Mozambique onto the global LNG stage, paving the way to a transformational change of the country through the development of gas resources,” said a statement.

Area 4 licence

Eni, as upstream operator of the Area 4 licence resources in the Coral South gas reservoir, is ramping up the project to its full liquefaction capacity of 3.4 million tonnes per annum.

The “Coral-Sul FLNG” vessel was constructed at Samsung Heavy Industries shipyard in Geoje in South Korea and is the first floating LNG facility ever deployed in the deep waters of East Africa.

The other partners of Eni in the FLNG project are US major ExxonMobil Corp., Chinese major China National Petroleum Corp., Galp Energia of Portugal, Korea Gas Corp. and Mozambique’s Empresa Nacional de Hidrocarbonetos (ENH), the state energy company.


The 174,000 cubic metres capacity LNG carrier “British Sponsor”, operated by BP, lifted the first cargo from the liquefaction hull.

BP has a long-term agreement spanning over 20 years to purchase 100 percent of LNG output from the project to add to its global supply portfolio.

President Nyusi and the Eni delegation in addition to visiting the “Coral Sul FLNG” hull also held talks on other possible LNG developments in Mozambique.

“They discussed the possibility of replicating the success of the Coral South project with further FLNG developments as well as other onshore projects,” said Eni.

“They also discussed the agri-feedstock project under an agreement between Eni and the Government of Mozambique,” it added.

“The project aims to produce oil from seeds, wastes and residues that do not compete with food crops and agriculture lands, to be used in biofuel production,” explained Eni.

The Mozambique government said US energy giant Exxon Mobil and partners such as PetroChina have finalized their investment plan for the southeast African nation’s Mamba LNG project backed by offshore Rovuma Basin resources and would hold a signing ceremony on October 8 in the capital Maputo.

Vitol, the global commodities company, has signed a 10-year time charter agreement with South Korean company H-Line Shipping for a newbuild liquefied natural gas carrier as its portfolio expands with the recent joint venture signed for Mozambique LNG trading.

Vitol, the global commodities company, has set up a joint venture with the National Hydrocarbons Company of Mozambique (ENH) to market liquefied natural gas from the stakes held by the Mozambicans in the various LNG projects under development in the country.

Italian Energy company Eni has sold a stake to Qatar Petroleum in an exploratory block offshore Mozambique, where several LNG projects are being developed from other blocks in the Rovuma Basin.

US major ExxonMobil and Italian energy company Eni have submitted their development plan envisaging an initial two production Trains for the first phase of the onshore Mozambique LNG export project using feed-gas from the Rovuma Basin Area 4 offshore licence.

The southeast African nation of Mozambique said it had signed a 20-year liquefied natural gas sales agreement with BP of the UK, with its project partner Italian energy company Eni, opening the way for progress on a floating LNG project.

The parliament of Mozambique has passed an amended petroleum law that authorizes the government to create "a special regime" for LNG processing in the offshore Rovuma Basin Areas 1 and 4, where Anadarko and Eni are operating with the aim of developing LNG export terminals.