LNG

European maritime classification society DNV said seven liquefied natural gas-powered ships were ordered in May and added that there could be a coming shortage of LNG bunkering ships as Northwest European bunkering prices continued to ease leading to market growth in the Dutch port of Rotterdam and elsewhere.

DNV’s Alternative Fuels Insight (AFI) platform, listed 19 vessels with alternative fuel propulsion ordered in May, seven for LNG and 12 methanol-fuelled vessels.

“So far this year the total order figure for alternative fuel vessels stands at 73,” said DNV.

The AFI platform also tracks battery installations for ships, through collaboration with the Maritime Battery Forum and reported that the official count of orders for vessels with battery power has passed 1,000.

“In May container vessels and car carriers continued to dominate the orders for ships equipped to use alternative fuels,” said Martin Wold, Principal Consultant in DNV’s Maritime Advisory business.

“Following the normalisation of gas prices the LNG bunkering market has now returned to full strength and we see a potential shortage of LNG bunker vessel capacity from 2025, and for some locations and periods this may occur even sooner,” stated Wold.

There are currently 399 LNG-fuelled vessels in operation worldwide and a further 512 ships are on order for delivery in the years to 2028.

Some 190 of these orders are for LNG-powered containerships and a further 122 vessels are Pure Car and Truck Carriers (PCTCs), while oil and chemical tankers are in the third-highest segment and the fourth-highest segment is for bulk carrier newbuilds.

LNG-fuelled tankers

There are 39 LNG-powered crude oil tankers on order, 25 cruise ships and 20 tugs, 11 RoPax vessels as well as single-figure numbers for car and passenger ferries, general cargo ships, offshore supply ships and fishing vessels.

This DNV data does not include smaller inland vessels and barges that are part, for example, of the Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp (ARA) refining hub transportation in northwest Europe or trading on major European rivers.

LNG bunkering fuel costs in Rotterdam have declined since the start of the year.

LNG fuel at Rotterdam was priced at the start of June 2023 at $546 per tonne compared with $814 per tonne at the start of May and $1,392 per tonne at the start of January 2023.

Among other emissions-reducing fuels, the price of Ultra Low Sulfur Fuel Oil (ULSFO) at the Dutch port actually rose to $573.26 per tonne at the start of June, up from  $567.16 per tonne at the start of May, but down from $639.82 per tonne at the beginning of 2023.

CMA CGM, the French container shipping line based in the Mediterranean port of Marseille and the third-largest in the world and with a growing fleet of LNG-powered vessels, has a new service to the LNG fuel location of Ennore port on the East Coast of India.

The containerships will expand port coverage with a direct call to Ennore, near Chennai in India, on the Westbound leg of the service connecting North Europe and the Mediterranean with Oceania as from June 2023.

“This new call will offer our customers a fast export connection from the main commercial area in South East India to Europe together with a direct import connection from Australia and Singapore,” said CMA CGM.

“Ennore is also a natural gateway from/to the Inland Container Depot of Bangalore covered with efficient rail connectivity,” added the French company.

The other LNG fuel ports in CMA CGM’s so-called NEMO service include Fos Sur Mer near Marseille, La Spezia in Italy, Rotterdam in the Netherlands, Malta and Singapore.

French LNG storage tanks designer GTT is supplying the tanks for six more LNG-powered containerships ordered from South Korea by CMA CGM.

The six containerships are being constructed at the Korean shipyard of Hyundai Samho Heavy Industries.

The vessels, each capable of carrying 8,000 containers, will be equipped with an LNG fuel tank with a capacity of 6,000 cubic metres.

The deliveries of the vessels are scheduled from the fourth quarter of 2024 to the fourth quarter of 2025.

CMA CGM is a pioneer of LNG-powered containerships and has about 12 more of the vessels being built in China.

The shipping line has said it is aiming to have a fleet of 44 LNG-fuelled containerships by 2024.

The 12 China-built vessels will be delivered between the last quarter of 2023 and the third quarter of 2024.

The construction contracts for those CMA CGM newbuilds were awarded to Hudong-Zhonghua Shipbuilding and Jiangnan Shipyard Co.

Each of the Chinese yards is building six vessels able to carry between 13,000 and 15,000 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) of containers.

The first ever LNG-powered containership was delivered to CMA CGM from the Hudong-Zhonghua yard and entered commercial operation in September 2020.

The 23,000 TEU “CMA CGM Jacques Saadé” was named after the late Lebanon-born founder of the shipping line and father of current Chairman Rodolphe Saadé.

European maritime classification society DNV said that there was still momentum in orders for LNG-powered vessels from ship owners in the month of November even at a time of very elevated LNG bunker prices in ports such as Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

According to the latest figures from DNV’s Alternative Fuels Insight (AFI) platform, 17 LNG vessels were added in November with container vessels and car carriers constituting nearly two thirds of the orders.

The total order figure for LNG-fuelled ships for the year to date has now reached 203 and the overall total is 857 ships operating or on order.

“With the preliminary agreement at the European Union last week that shipping would be included in the EU's Emissions Trading System starting from 2024, all low-carbon options now makes even more sense,” said Martin Wold, Principal Consultant in DNV’s Maritime Advisory business.

“Methane emissions will also be included, so methane slip from engines will come under even greater scrutiny,” added Wold.

Containerships lead

The DNV data showed that the total number of LNG-powered ships in operation or on order at the end of November 2022 comprised in the largest sectors 42 containerships in operation and 176 on order, 10 car carriers operating and 106 on order, 46 crude oil tankers operating and 43 on order and 42 oil-chemical tankers operating and 46 on order.

There were also 68 bulk carriers using and planning to use LNG, 50 car and passenger ferries, 39 cruise liners, 38 tugs, 37 offshore supply vessels and 32 RoPax ships.

This data does not include smaller inland vessels and barges that are part of the Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp (ARA) refining hub transportation in northwest Europe.

Analysts note that LNG remained the preferred low-carbon solution despite current gas pricing which is expected to last into the near future.

That’s as LNG priced in fuel oil terms at Rotterdam increased on December 6 to $2,414 a tonne compared with $1,890 per tonne on November 6.

Among other emissions-reducing fuels, Ultra Low Sulfur Fuel Oil (ULSFO) at the Dutch port declined over the past month to $690.00 per tonne on December 6 versus $923.50 per tonne on November 6.

European maritime classification society DNV said that there was still momentum in orders for LNG-powered vessels from ship owners in the month of September even at a time of very elevated LNG bunker prices in ports such as Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

The DNV report said that at the end of September there were 833 confirmed LNG-powered ships, six more than in August, and 229 additional LNG-ready ships, while LNG bunkering infrastructure was continuing to be developed worldwide.

“According to the latest figures from DNV’s Alternative Fuels Insight (AFI) platform, 14 LNG vessels were added in September. However, contract cancellations limits the net increase to six ships,” explained DNV.

“This last quarter was the slowest on record since the fourth quarter of 2020 with a net increase of 26 ships, which we attribute mainly to reduced newbuild contracting in general,” said the Norway-based class society.

“The total order figure for the year to date has reached 179 with mainly container liners helping to keep the momentum up this month,” stated DNV.

For methanol-fuelled ships the data showed the total at 66 vessels with around 40 percent of the fleet also transporting methanol as cargo.

Containerships lead

The DNV data showed that total number of LNG-powered ships in operation or on order at the end of September 2022 comprised in the largest sectors 211 containerships, 106 car carriers, 89 crude oil tankers and 54 oil-chemical tankers.

There were also 66 bulk carriers using and planning to use LNG, 50 car and passenger ferries, 39 cruise liners, 38 tugs, 37 offshore supply vessels and 33 RoPax ships.

This data does not include smaller inland vessels and barges that are part of the Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp (ARA) refining hub transportation in northwest Europe.

Analysts note that LNG remained the preferred low-carbon solution despite current gas pricing which is expected to last into the near future.

That’s as LNG priced in fuel oil terms at Rotterdam declined sharply at the start of October to $2,870 a tonne, well down from the previous record of around $4,545 per tonne at the start of September 2022.

Among other emissions-reducing fuels, Ultra Low Sulfur Fuel Oil (ULSFO) at the Dutch port declined during the period and was priced at the start of October at around $915 per tonne compared with $990 per tonne at the start of September.

European maritime classification society DNV said that ship owners placed orders for 30 more LNG-fuelled vessels in the month of May 2022 even as bunkering fuel prices were at elevated levels in ports such as Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

South Korean shipbuilder Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering has won $4 billion in orders so far in 2022, including eight LNG carriers, six containerships, one offshore platform and one depot maintenance order.

DSME added that the six containerships ordered this year have a specification for dual-fuel capability.

The latest DSME orders included three LNG carriers for the Americas after the company previously said there had been two LNG carrier orders worth 521 billion South Korean won ($428M).

The yard has now added one more vessel for the order list from the Americas, taking the total for the region to 863.5Bln Korean won ($710M).

“These LNG ships will be built at the Okpo Shipyard and delivered to the owner by the end of 2025,” said DSME.

GasLog Ltd, the Greek LNG shipping company, has also ordered LNG carrier from DSME in 2022.

GasLog is currently expanding its fleet and has ordered four newbuild 174,000 cubic metres capacity vessels for delivery in 2024 and 2025.

DSME, which is the world’s fourth largest shipbuilder, had an order backlog of $10.86Bln because of increased demand for valued-added vessels, such as LNG carriers and very large containerships with dual-fuel propulsion.

The latest three LNG carrier orders for the Americas will be of 174,000 cubic metres capacity.

The yard added that they would also be equipped with the latest generation M-type Electronically Controlled, Gas Injection (ME-GI) propulsion system.

DSME said it was also fitting a more advanced re-liquefaction system.

“The yard’s other smart energy saving systems, such as the Shaft Generator Motor and their Lubrication System, are representative of eco-friendly new technologies that can improve fuel efficiency and reduce carbon-dioxide and sulfur-oxide emissions,” added the DSME statement.

French major TotalEnergies has launched its first LNG bunkering operation for containerships at the West Mediterranean Port of Marseille Fos with an LNG-powered 15,000 twenty-foot units (TEU) containership re-fuelled.

The “CMA CGM Bali” operates on the Asia-to-South Europe route for Marseille-based shipping line CMA CGM.

“The containership was refuelled by the bunkering vessel ‘Gas Vitality’, which has 6,000 cubic metres of capacity operated a ship-to-ship transfer alongside the Eurofos container terminal, while the containership carried out cargo operations simultaneously,” explained TotalEnergies.

The “Gas Vitality” is the second LNG bunker vessel chartered by TotalEnergies from the owner, Japan’s Mitsui OSK Lines.

“This entire operation underlines a solid collaborative teamwork across the French maritime industry including the involvement of local port authorities to enable the vessels’ safe operatorship, and the commitments of all the parties to support the growing role of LNG,” said Jérôme Leprince-Ringuet, Vice-President at ToatlEnergies Marine Fuels.

“TotalEnergies is delighted to successfully complete Marseille’s first LNG bunkering operation of a containership,” added Leprince-Ringuet.

“Her deployment underscores the company’s commitment to support the French port’s ambition to be an LNG bunkering hub for the
Mediterranean region,” stated the executive.

TotalEnergies has actively invested in LNG infrastructure, critical to support its shipping customers’ uptake of LNG as a marine fuel.

The company has been operating an even larger bunkering vessel, the 18,600 cubic metres capacity “Gas Agility” since November 2020 at the Dutch Port of Rotterdam.

It was at Rotterdam that the “Gas Agility” completed the first LNG bunkering operation of the “CMA CGM Jacques Saade”, the largest dual-fuel LNG-powered containership in the world.

“TotalEnergies will also commence operations of a third LNG bunker vessel to serve Singapore,” it noted.

“The company was awarded an LNG bunker supplier licence for a five-year term starting on January 1st, 2022,” it added.

In the global LNG market TotalEnergies is the world's second-largest publicly traded player and will have a global portfolio of nearly 50 million tonnes per annum from after 2025.

The Paris-based company has stakes in 10 LNG liquefaction and export plants worldwide in Angola, Australia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, the US, Nigeria, Norway, Oman, Russia and Qatar.

Korea Shipbuilding and Offshore Engineering Co. (KSOE) the world's biggest shipbuilder by order backlog, has secured deals to build five vessels, including LNG-powered containerships, a week after the European Commission vetoed the nation’s huge shipbuilding merger between Hyundai and Daewoo.

French energy companies have joined together for a project to use the waste from the trash cans and rubbish bins of Marseille and the surrounding area of the Mediterranean port to make bio-liquefied natural gas of sufficient quality to be used as fuel for shipping.

The American Bureau of Shipping, the US maritime classification society, and Singapore-based Keppel Offshore and Marine said they were currently completing key features of the world’s first smart LNG bunkering vessel.