LNG

Leading European Union LNG import terminal owner and grid operator, Enagás of Spain, has signed a firm agreement in Albania to help the Balkan nation’s natural gas company AlbGaz develop its markets and infrastructure.

An LNG carrier, the 162,000 cubic metres “Adam LNG”, was hit by a bulk carrier while at anchor off Gibraltar’s Europa Point, and there were no injuries to either crew, though the cargo ship suffered the most damage and had to be beached off Catalan Bay, a main tourist area on the Rock.

Oct 13 (LNGJ) - Italian utility Edison and Knutsen OAS Shipping of Norway have held a naming ceremony at the northeast Italian port of Ravenna for the 30,000 cubic metres capacity LNG carrier, “Ravenna Knutsen”. The vessel will serve a small-scale LNG import terminal joint venture at the port.

   The terminal will supply at least 12,000 trucks and up to 48 ferries per annum with LNG fuel. Edison and Spain’s gas grid operator Enagás are shareholders in the Italian facility and are cooperating on developing small-scale LNG use in the Mediterranean region of both Italy and Spain. “The vessel is pivotal in the first integrated small-scale LNG logistics chain in Italy, which Edison has built to promote the decarbonisation of maritime and heavy transport,” said Edison.

Italian utility Edison and Enagás, the Spanish natural gas grid operator and LNG terminal network owner, have delivered the first cargo to their small-scale LNG import terminal joint venture at the port of Ravenna on the northeast coast of Italy.

Elengy, the French LNG terminal operator and its subsidiary Fosmax LNG, are launching an open season for capacity subscriptions at the Fos Cavaou facility, located in the Mediterranean west of the Port of Marseilles.

Three of France’s LNG terminals, Fos Tonkin, Fos Cavaou in the Mediterranean and Montoir-de-Bretagne on the Atlantic Coast, are operated by Elengy within the Engie Group and as subsidiaries of GRTgaz, France’s gas network operator.

Fosmax LNG is calling for capacity subscriptions at the Fos Cavaou terminal during 2021.

The Fos Cavaou facility has been operating since 2010 and has three storage tanks with combined capacity of 330,000 cubic metres.

France has a total of four terminals and the most modern facility opened in 2016 at Dunkirk on the Channel Coast and has capacity of 570,000 cubic metres in three tanks.

Elengy explained that Fos Cavaou’s operations are currently guaranteed through to March 2030 by ongoing subscriptions and contracts totaling 87 terawatt hours per year of capacity.

“Fos Cavaou, at the crossroads of maritime routes and major gas infrastructures, offers a privileged access to all European gas markets and the small-scale potential in a key Mediterranean location,” said Elengy.

“The ‘Open Season Fos Cavaou 2021’ is initiated in response to a high level of market interest expressed over the past few months, and aims to make available additional primary capacity achieved through technical and regulatory de-bottlenecking, as well as capacity extensions beyond 2030,” explained Elengy

The windows of interest offered include 1.0 billion cubic metres per annum from January 2022, 2.5 Bcm per annum from January 2024 and 4.5 Bcm per annum from April 2030 until 2045 or longer.

The open season will have two phases. Firstly, there will be a non-binding call for interest, which is expected to last for three months to precisely assess market needs.

Secondly, there will be a binding Open Season, which is expected during the second half of 2021 to perform a market test based on binding commitments of the parties.

“Registration for ‘Open Season Fos Cavaou 2021’ is now open, and shippers wishing to register are invited to complete and sign the Confidentiality Agreement, provided on the Fosmax LNG website, and send a digital copy by email return,” explained Elengy.

The Balkan state of Croatia, part of the former Yugoslavia and which became a member of the European Union in 2013, will receive its first liquefied natural gas cargo from the United States on January 1 after a vessel left the Cove Point plant in Maryland headed for the Mediterranean.

Around 102 LNG shipments were being lifted this week versus 91 last week at global liquefaction plants as the US saw 14 cargoes departing from its facilities and the North Asia spot LNG price moved above the $6.87 mark, while US and European natural gas benchmarks hit $2.98 per MMBtu and $5.65 per MMBtu respectively.

French energy major Total and Japanese shipping company Mitsui OSK Lines have attended a naming ceremony in the Dutch port of Rotterdam for the “Gas Agility”, the world’s largest LNG bunkering vessel.

Cyprus has held a foundation stone-laying ceremony at the site of the Mediterranean Island’s first LNG import terminal being built at Vasilikos port near Limassol by a Chinese company and partly financed by the European Union.

French energy major Total has signed an agreement to renew its partnership in the field of liquefied natural gas with the North African state of Algeria as Italian energy company Eni also advances with projects.

The accord between Total and Algerian oil and gas company Sonatrach allows the extension of the existing supply contracts for three additional years.

This will provide 2 million tonnes per annum of Algerian LNG to the French market, primarily through the LNG import terminal at Fos Cavaou, located east of the Mediterranean port of Marseilles.

Total said that the agreement also included the sub-charter of one of its LNG carriers to Sonatrach.

“This agreement is part of the long history of cooperation between Total and Sonatrach,” said Laurent Vivier, President for gas at Total.

“Thanks to the quality of our relationship we were able to conclude it in an extremely volatile market environment,” added Vivier.

“This new contract further enhances the flexibility of Total's LNG portfolio and strengthens our position as a major partner of Sonatrach,” he stated.

Total noted it was a historic player in the energy sector in Algeria for almost 70 years.

The group is active in oil and gas exploration and production, participating interests in the TFT II and Timimoun gas fields and in the oil fields of the Berkine Basin in southeast Algeria.

In addition, Total and Sonatrach have launched engineering studies for a petrochemical project in Western Algeria.

Algerian LNG exports have been falling and in the most recent official annual figures dropped by over 18 percent to about 10 million tonnes compared with 12.34MT the previous year from its two liquefaction plants at Skikda and Arzew on the Mediterranean Coast.

Italian energy company Eni and Sonatrach have completed the construction of the natural gas pipeline connecting the Bir Rebaa Nord and Menzel Ledjmet Est fields in the Berkine Basin.

The completion comes as Algeria is making three-pronged marketing efforts to direct new gas finds into domestic industry, for export as pipeline gas to Europe and as LNG to mostly European markets amid low prices and high global volumes.

The new Berkine Basin pipeline is 185 kilometres in length and 16 inches in diameter and will transport capacity of 7 million standard cubic metres of gas per day to markets.


That project will allow for the export of the associated gas produced in Block 403 and the development of the gas fields of the blocks of North Berkine, where the drilling of the first four wells have already been completed and linked.

Sonatrach has been increasing the capacity of its export infrastructure like the Medgaz gas pipeline to Spain, and building a new LNG jetty at the Skikda liquefaction plant.