LNG

Elengy, the operator of three terminals in Western and Southern France at Montoir-de-Bretagne, Fos Tonkin and Fos Cavaou has increased the LNG trucking capabilities at the Fos Cavaou facility located west of the Mediterranean port of Marseille.

The Managing Director of Elengy, Nelly Nicoli, inaugurated the two new tank-truck loading bays at the Fos Cavaou terminal.

The LNG fuel expansion event was also attended by René Raimondi, Mayor of the town of Fos, Hervé Martel, President of the Grand Port Maritime de Marseilles, and Régis Passerieux, Sub-Prefect of the district of Istres.

The new loading bays at Fos Cavaou now give the West Med terminal four bays with the capacity to offer 22,000 slots a year.

“LNG constitutes an immediate and effective response to the challenges of the energy transition in the road transport sector by reducing carbon-dioxide emissions,” stated Nicoli.

Commissioning

“With this commissioning, Elengy will continue with the development of its infrastructure to provide reliable and sustainable access to LNG for road transport,” added Nicoli.

“The two new bays of Fos Cavaou represented an investment of €10 million ($10.8M),” she stated.

Elengy has been expanding LNG truck-loading bays since 2013 at the Montoir-de-Bretagne and the Fos Tokin and Fos Cavaou terminals.

Over the past 10 years around 70,000 trucks have been loaded with LNG for the gradually expanding fuel market in the European Union.

Ship movements

Elengy’s three regulated terminals offer market flexibility for the unloading or loading of any type of LNG carriers as well as trans-shipment services.

The company’s LNG carrier traffic amounts to around 330 ships per annum at the three facilities.

Elengy added that during 2023 LNG had also been loaded into ISO containers at the Fos terminals for transportation by rail.

The company said it was also developing its services by investing in the development of bio-LNG made from waste to reduce the environmental footprint of the fuel.

A company in Nagpur, one of the main cities in the western Indian state of Maharashtra, has set up the nation’s first commercial liquefied natural gas filling station for LNG-powered vehicles.

The LNG station is owned by Shree Baidyanath, an Indian group specializing in medicines, food and cosmetics distribution and making its first foray into the energy sector.

The first Indian LNG station open to the public was inaugurated in Nagpur on July 11.

It is located on the outer ring road towards Dighori and can serve LNG-powered cars, trucks or buses.

At present, four of India’s LNG import terminals have truck-loading stations for contracted customers, but cannot service random members of the public.

“This is the first-ever in the country to operate on a commercial basis,” said Subbarao Vaddadi, director of B-LNG, the fuel division of the Baidyanath group.

Baidyanath’s branching out into LNG was supported by the Indian Transportation Minister Nitin Gadkari, who is also a member of parliament in New Dehli for the City for Nagpur.

The Minister was looking for local companies to come forward and set up the LNG station and the Baidyanath group agreed to invest in the project.

“The station is operational and can take 60 vehicles a day for the pump to operate feasibly,” said B-LNG’s Vaddadi.

The Baidyanath group said it also had plans to convert 120 vehicles in Nagpur, including buses and trucks, to run on LNG.

The company said that LNG is being promoted as a cleaner alternative to diesel and the price of the LNG fuel at the Nagpur station would be lower than the current market price to encourage uptake of LNG fuel for transport.

LNG terminal truck-loading is available at India’s biggest terminal, the Dahej facility in the West Coast state of Gujarat and owned by Petronet LNG, as well as Petronet’s Kochi terminal in Kerala and the Hazira and Mundra terminals in the northwest.

LNG as a fuel for transport has been slow to take off in India even in the midst of increasing urban pollution problems.

In June 2021 the state of Kerala started a trial of LNG-powered buses in the first stage of a possible nationwide roll-out.

The LNG and the buses are being supplied to the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) by Kochi LNG terminal owner Petronet.

The KSRTC has also drawn up plans to convert several hundred diesel-fuelled buses to LNG.

The Dutch Gate LNG import terminal in Rotterdam, now the focus of more trans-shipment activity from Russia, has requested interested parties to book capacity in an open season process.