A first cargo of Russian LNG is en route to joint venture KARMOL’s yet-to-start-up floating storage and regasification unit off Senegal in West Africa.
Kpler data shows Karpowerhip’s 154,472-cbm Karadeniz LNGT Powership Anatolia (ex-LNG Unity, built 2006) is loaded with a cargo and is scheduled to arrive in Dakar on 16 May.
Eikland Energy’s iGIS/LNG data shows the Karadeniz LNGT Powership Anatolia loaded in a ship-to-ship transfer of LNG from Gazprom’s 174,100-cbm FSRU Marshal Vasilevskiy (built 2018) off the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad on 29 to 30 April.
According to iGIS/LNG calculations the Karpowership vessel took on about 125,000-cbm of LNG in the STS operation. The FSRU Marshal Vasilevskiy originally loaded these volumes at Russia's Portovaya LNG plant on the Baltic Sea coast near Vyborg on 22 March.
TradeWinds has asked Karpowership for details about the shipment to Senegal.
KARMOL — a Mitsui OSK Lines and Karpowership joint-venture —installed the 125,000-cbm KARMOL LNGT Powership Africa (ex-Dwiputra, built 1994) in June 2021.
An initial shipment was due to arrive at the regas unit in July of that year. But the vessel sat idle for the first eight to nine months.
A first cargo to be supplied by Shell, which is signed up to ship volumes to the Dakar FSRU, was later flagged up to arrive in the first quarter of 2022. But those following the project said the soaring price of LNG, which jumped to record levels post Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, put a pause on shipments.
Sources said the KARMOL FSRU is fully commissioned as is the pipeline connecting the vessel to the shore.
The FSRU will be used to supply gas to an existing powership — the 235-MW powership Karadeniz Powership Aysegul Sultan — stationed off Dakar which is controlled by Karpowership. But this publication understands that there is also an onshore power plant waiting to receive gas.
In December, Karpowership recently used its trading vessel Karadeniz LNGT Powership Anatolia to deliver a shipment to another KARMOL FSRU, the 127,452-cbm FSRU KARMOL LNGT Powership Asia (built 1991), which has been anchored in Sepetiba Bay, Brazil, since May 2022.
The 17-year-old vessel is believed to be trading using only three of its four cargo tanks.
KARMOL recently completed the conversion of a third LNG carrier — the 127,000-cbm LNG Vesta (built 1994) — into an FSRU in Singapore. But the joint venture has yet to indicate a location for this unit which has since been renamed the FSRU KARMOL LNGT Powership Europe.
Karpowership has been reported to have revived its project applications to install FSRUs and powerships at up to three sites in South Africa.
