Steel cutting is scheduled to start within days for Shell’s monster Prelude floating LNG production unit (illustrated).Officials from the company and shipbuilder Samsung Heavy Industries are understood to be consulting their diaries for a suitable date for the supermajor’s VIPs to attend a ceremony at the South Korean shipyard on Geoje Island.The start of work on the first Shell LNG floating production, storage and offloading vessel will mark a significant milestone in the emerging FLNG sector, consultants said, as the first large project moves off the drawing board.The hull for the Prelude floater will be built in SHI’s No. 3 dry-dock. Land has been set aside at the yard for the project and any sister units that Shell and its partners may decide to order.At 488 metres long and 74 metres wide, and with a displacement of 600,000 tonnes, the vessel looks set to be the largest structure built in a shipyard.The hull and topsides will take at least five years to build and assemble. When complete, the unit will have the capacity to produce 3.6 million tonnes per annum of LNG, 1.3 million tpa of condensate and 400,000 tpa of LPG.Some 5000 people will be employed to construct the floater. A further 1000 will build the turret-and-mooring system, subsea and wells equipment.Around 250 Shell construction staff will also work on the project.In July, chief executive Peter Voser suggested the supermajor, which has not given a clear date when Prelude will be operational, was working towards 2017 for start-up.The company is considering using the technology on two to three other projects, he added.