The first of two massive LNG floating storage units (FSUs) for deployment in the Russian Arctic is nearing completion at Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering for a possible delivery this month, despite delays to Russia’s next-up LNG project.
TradeWinds has obtained some of the first photos to emerge of the 361,600-cbm sister ships Saam FSU and Koryak FSU, which are to become the focal points of two transshipment hubs.
Sources said the Saam FSU is scheduled to be delivered first this month. Clarksons’ Shipping Intelligence Network lists it as due for handover in May. Towage of the unit to Ura Bay, near Murmansk, north-west Russia, is expected in the first half of the year.
The Koryak FSU is due to be deployed in Bechevinskaya Bay on the eastern side of the Kamchatka Peninsula, north-east Russia before the end of 2023. The infrastructure for this facility is being built by the China Communications Construction Co.
The two giant FSUs — the largest purpose-built storage units ever constructed for LNG — were ordered by the Russian state-owned State Transport Leasing Co (GTLK).
They are pictured kitted out with hard cargo loading and discharging arms on their port and starboard sides, blunt bows and helidecks at their sterns.
DSME signed newbuilding contracts on the pair in June 2020. The South Korean yard signed a deal on the barge duo worth KRW 901bn (then $748m), pricing them at $374m each.
They were originally due for handover in 2022.
In September 2021, Mitsui OSK Lines, which has been providing technical and engineering support for the FSUs’ construction, said it had signed a letter of intent with GTLK to acquire 49% stakes in the units.
At the time, the FSUs were referenced as being bareboat chartered to Novatek and TotalEnergies joint venture Arctic Transshipment. But TotalEnergies pulled out of its Russian business in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Novatek is now widely referenced as the charterer of the units, which are part of Russia’s plan to optimise the use of its 15-ship strong, ice-breaking Arc7 LNG carrier fleet that serves the Novatek-led Yamal LNG project.
The two FSUs will in effect be sited at the western and eastern ends of the Northern Sea Route.
Under Novatek’s plans, Arc7 vessels will transship cargoes into the FSUs for visiting conventional or lesser ice-class vessels to collect, leaving the more specialised ships to concentrate on shipping LNG through the waters with the toughest ice conditions.
The war in Ukraine looked set to delay Novatek’s plans to start its second Arctic-based project — Arctic LNG 2 — as foreign contractors pulled out of Russia. But on Monday, Novatek chairman of the management board Leonid Mikhelson said the company is sticking to its original plan to bring a first train online at the end of 2023.
Novatek is scheduled to take on three more Arc7 LNG carriers from MOL being built at DSME.
The yard cancelled three of the Arc7 vessels contracted by Sovcomflot but is continuing construction of the ships, at present for its own account.
In addition, work is thought to be continuing on five of 15 Arc7 LNG carriers, three of which are being fitted out at the Zvezda Shipbuilding Complex in Russia after their hulls were built by Samsung Heavy Industries in South Korea.
