LNG

Denmark, one of the largest energy traders in LNG and gas and power in the Nordic market, has brought pipeline natural gas supplies to two of the nation’s isolated areas.

The Danish Energy Agency has issued permits for Energinet and Evida to put the Lolland-Falster pipeline into operation on Danish maritime territory in Storstrømmen and Guldborg Sund.

“The Danish Energy Agency has granted a license to Energinet for the commissioning and operation of the Lolland-Falster gas pipeline on Danish lake territory in Storstrømmen and a licence to Evida for commissioning and operation of the pipeline on Danish territory in Guldborg Sund,” said the Agency.

The Lolland-Falster pipeline in Danish waters is part of a larger gas pipeline project between Everdrup on Zealand and Nakskov on Lolland.

Capacity

The gas pipeline runs as an underwater pipeline at the water crossings at Storstrømmen and Guldborg Sund.

The total length of the pipeline route is around 115 kilometres (72 miles) long and the pipeline can transport up to 290 million cubic metres of natural gas per year.

According to the timetables of both companies commissioning is planned for 30 August 2024.

The Agency said the nation’s consumption of natural gas fell by more than 10 percent in 2023 while the share of bio-natural gas made from waste increased its share of the energy mix.

Denmark is part of the changing Nordic regional energy market where Norway is an LNG exporter and Sweden and Finland are LNG importers, while the Norwegians and Swedes additionally supply power to Denmark.

Additionally the Danes are a conduit for pipeline gas supplies to the Baltic region.

Natural gas consumption in Denmark amounted to around 1.7 billion cubic metres for all of last year, a decrease compared with the previous year.

Natural gas use by the Danes peaked in 2006 at 5.3 Bcm per annum.

The United Kingdom by comparison has much larger natural gas consumption.

UK gas use averaged around 7.4 Bcm per month during the past winter and 72 Bcm for the year, down from almost 79 Bcm in the previous year.

Excelerate Energy, the leading US provider of floating LNG import terminals, said its floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU), the “Exemplar”, arrived at the port of Inkoo, in Finland to become a Baltic regional supplier of natural gas.

The FSRU was previously loaded with a partial cargo of LNG which would serve as the initial commissioning cargo for the terminal.

The FSRU “Exemplar” has been chartered to Gasgrid Finland Oy for a period of 10 years.

“It will provide flexible, reliable, and secure delivery of regasified LNG to Finland and other Baltic countries,” said Excelerate.

Inkoo port is located on the Southern Coast of Finland and provides an optimal deepwater port at close proximity to the pipelines distributing the gas mainly to industrial end-users in the Baltic region.

The developer had made the move to enable independence from Russian pipeline natural gas.

The FSRU capacity alone is sufficient for the gas needs of both Finland and Estonia. Russian gas supplies through the Imatra entry point into Finland have been stopped since May 2022.

Finland already has two onshore LNG terminals at Pori and Tornio. They have been in operation since 2016 and 2018 respectively.

Infrastructure

“The arrival of the FSRU ‘Exemplar’ at the port of Inkoo represents an important milestone for Finland as it prepares to enhance its energy security and bring essential energy infrastructure to the region,” said Steven Kobos, President and Chief Executive of Excelerate.

“This is a tremendous accomplishment for everyone involved, and we are proud to have partnered with Gasgrid on this opportunity,” added Kobos.

In addition to providing regasification services under the time charter with Gasgrid, Excelerate said that through its recently formed Finnish gas marketing subsidiary, Excelerate Finland Gas Marketing, the US firm has executed an agreement for the sale of commissioning volumes and regasification capacity rights during the commissioning phase.

“Through this agreement, Excelerate Finland will be able to provide natural gas to downstream customers in Finland and other Baltic countries,” explained the Houston-based company.

Excelerate explained that the FSRU “Exemplar” departed drydock in Spain on December 6 where it underwent customer-requested winterization upgrades.

“The vessel subsequently procured its cargo from Excelerate’s global LNG portfolio via a ship-to-ship transfer with the FSRU ‘Excelsior’ near Gibraltar,” said the company.

“The ‘Excelsior’ recently completed its 10-year service in Israel and will go on charter to the Federal Republic of Germany in 2023,” it added.

The FSRU “Exemplar” is 291 metres long and 43 meters wide. It has a storage capacity of 150,900 cubic metres of LNG and can provide more than 5 billion cubic metres per annum of regasification capacity.

GRTgaz, the French natural gas grid operator and parent company of the main LNG terminals operator, has signed an agreement with the network operator of the Baltic state of Latvia for the French utility to support the modernization of the Latvian gas system and its energy transition process.

The first day of 2020 will see the Finnish pipeline natural gas market open up to competition and the transmission sector and the wholesale gas market will be unbundled from each other.