An LNG carrier that has been converted into a specialised floating storage unit for a Russian midscale LNG project is being offered for charter as delays to the development lengthen.
Chartering sources said the 138,107-cbm Portovyy (built 2003), the former Excel, is showing as open on brokers’ position lists.
But they added that the vessel’s ice belt — a structure that extends out about 1.5 metres from its port side before angling back down to the hull — is making the ship tricky to fix because it limits its trading ability to portside port calls.
Joint development
The Portovyy FSU will be stationed at Gazprom’s Portovaya LNG export plant on the Baltic Sea coast near Vyborg. It will use pipeline gas to produce 1.5 million tonnes per annum of LNG.
It will be moored starboard side at Portovaya with the ice belt designed to protect its portside hull from ice floes.
The project is being jointly developed with Russian engineering company SRDI Oil & Gas Peton, and the FSU was originally due to be on site earlier this year. But start-up has been delayed, with some reports suggesting first exports might not now start until mid-2020.
This has left SRDI Oil & Gas Peton, which was working with Gazprom Marketing & Trading on the FSU conversion, looking for business for the now unusually shaped vessel.
The membrane-type LNG carrier went into Drydocks World in Dubai for the conversion a year ago. It underwent life-extension work and had steel plate changed to strengthen its hull.
The Portovyy has been sitting off the Dubai shipyard for months since the conversion job was completed. It has yet to undergo gas trials, which would be expected to take place closer to its departure for Russia.
Once on site, the FSU will be moored behind a breakwater and take on cargoes produced by the plant until they are ready to be offloaded onto visiting vessels. Longer-term plans for Portovaya include building onshore LNG storage.
The unit will be capable of loading and discharging simultaneously and has been designed to remain on site for 20 years.
Russian oil and gas producer Gazprom Neft has ordered a 5,800-cbm, ice-class 1A vessel from Keppel Shipyard in Singapore to supply LNG as bunkers from the Portovaya project.
