JERA, the world’s largest buyer of LNG, has agreed a long-term charter for an LNG carrier newbuilding with John Angelicoussis.
The charter period for the Maran Gas Maritime vessel is 12 years firm starting from around 2020, the Japanese energy giant confirmed.
The charter deal with Angelicoussis was agreed at the same time as JERA signed a similar deal with John Livanos-backed GasLog, but went unreported.
The vessels will be utilized principally for the transportation of LNG from the Freeport LNG Project in Texas, in which JERA participates.
Both vessels are under construction in South Korea – the 173,400-cbm Angelicoussis ship at Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering and the 180,000-cbm GasLog vessel at Samsung Heavy Industries.
JERA said it plans to increase its LNG fleet to 25 vessels by 2025 in association with an increased ratio of FOB contracts.
Going forward, JERA said it is aiming to develop and optimize its fuel transportation businesses to achieve “stable, competitive and flexible fuel portfolio”.
Separately, JERA confirmed that it had completed the merger of its LNG optimisation and trading activities with those of France’s EDF Trading into JERA Global Markets (JERAGM), the new name for JERA Trading Pte Ltd.
JERAGM is now said to be the exclusive LNG optimiser for JERA and EDF, managing their collective short and medium-term LNG optimisation activities in the wholesale markets.
JERA said the transaction follows the successful completion of the acquisition of EDF Trading’s coal business by JERAGM in April 2017.
