LNG

Lithuanian fuel company Klaipedos Nafta has invited market participants to book regasification and cargo capacities for the first three months of the coming winter season from October to the end of December 2022.

The Baltic nation’s operator of oil and gas and fuel storage at the Lithuanian port of Klaipeda said the floating LNG terminal would offer a total of 9.66 terawatt hours during the allocation procedure.

The Baltic states of Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia have only one import terminal between them at the Lithuanian port in the form of the 170,000 cubic metres capacity floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU) “Independence”, delivered in 2014 by Norway’s Höegh LNG Holdings.

Höegh LNG has since expressed its intention to sell the FSRU “Independence” to a suitable buyer as Höegh itself was subjected to a corporate overhaul after an internal takeover.

“In order to ensure that the services of the terminal can be used by as many customers as possible, the capacity of the LNG terminal will be allocated,” said Klaipedos Nafta.

The company said that new regulations provide that a single terminal user may not book more than half of the terminal's allocated capacity.

Preferences

“In the event that the supply of terminal capacity exceeds the demand, the capacity shall be allocated on a ‘pro rata’ basis, with preference given to the companies, which have used the services of the LNG terminal in the last three years and are therefore familiar with the operating principles,” explained Klaipedos Nafta.

Later in 2022, Klaipedos Nafta also stated that it planned to offer the market the possibility to book long-term capacity at the LNG terminal from January 2023 for a period of five or 10 years.

The relevant amendments to the regulations for the use of the terminal have been submitted for market consultation.

“One of the technical changes we will follow next year will align the so-called gas year with the calendar year,” explained Jurgita Šilinskaitė-Venslovienė, Head of LNG at Klaipedos Nafta.

“That is why we are currently initiating capacity allocation for a relatively short period of three months,” she added.

“Already in June, we will invite customers to assess the long-term capacity needs of the LNG terminal, for which we are currently making the final preparations,” she concluded.

The Klaipedos Nafta said applications for terminal capacity scan be submitted to the company until the 17th of May at 4:30 PM Lithuanian time.

Joint annual and monthly schedules of LNG cargoes delivered to the terminal will continue to be published and updated on the Klaipedos Nafta website.

“For the gas year, lasting from 1 October 2021 to 30 September 2022, customers have booked a total of 23.9 TWh of Klaipeda terminal capacity,” it added. 

Lithuanian LNG and oil terminal company Klaipedos Nafta said it had joined with Asian partners from South Korea and Japan in bidding in the tender process for an LNG import terminal on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus and gave more details of consortium plans.

Klaipedos Nafta has operated the Lithuanian LNG import terminal since 2014 at the Baltic Port of Klaipeda as well as an LNG re-loading station.

The Lithuania facility is a floating storage and regasification unit under charter from Hoegh LNG.

Klaipedos Nafta said it was bidding for the Cyprus project with consortium partners consisting of South Korean companies Samsung C&T and Posco E&C as well as the Japanese shipping company Mitsui OSK Lines (MOL) and the utility Osaka Gas.

The second consortium includes Monaco-based LNG shipping company Gaslog, a unit of Spanish utility Enagas and the Italian gas network and infrastructure company, Societa Nazionale Metanodotti (Snam).

The third group of bidders is led by China Petroleum Pipeline Engineering.

The original deadline had been set for the end of March and has now been moved to September 6.

The Cypriot Natural Gas Public Company (DEFA) has also invited expressions of interest for the supply of LNG for the FSRU.

The tender for the supply of the LNG is the second part of the gas-to-power project.

Klaipedos Nafta said it was participating in the tender as a contractor and partner of the consortium.

According to the published specifications, the LNG terminal will include an FSRU, a jetty for mooring the vessel and a jetty-borne gas pipeline to secure supply of natural gas to the Vasilikos power plant, the largest in Cyprus.

The project has been granted European Union support amounting to a grant of 100 million euros ($111.4M).

If winning the tender, Klaipedos Nafta said it would join with MOL and Osaka Gas to provide terminal operator services for a period of up to 20 years.