Morgan Stanley and its shipping advisor Exmar have completed the first ship-to-ship transfer of an LNG cargo in open water off Argentina as operations at the new GNL Escobar floating import facility ramp up.
Some 40,000 cbm was discharged from the 138,106-cbm LNG carrier Excel (built 2003) into the Morgan Stanley-chartered 89,900-cbm Arctic Spirit (built 1993).
Industry sources said the transfer took less than two days and was carried out in the designated Charlie or C-zone in the River Plate, close to the mouth of the Parana River.
The operation eased the draft sufficiently on Excel for the vessel to travel up the restricted channel to reach Excelerate Energy’s 151,072-cbm LNG regasification vessel Exemplar (built 2010), which is acting as the floating import terminal.
Arctic Spirit was then able to follow with its 40,000-cbm shipment.
The partners have also notched up the first coastal trade of LNG in Argentina between the floating import terminal at Bahia Blanca and the more northerly facility at GNL Escobar.
This was achieved when 50,000 cbm of LNG was loaded from the 138,120-cbm LNG regasification vessel Excellence (built 2005), which serves as the import terminal at Bahia Blanca, into Arctic Spirit.
The latter then shipped these volumes directly to Escobar.
Morgan Stanley, which is supplying the bulk of the Escobar cargoes, has also been using conventional-size LNG carriers to make double discharges at both of Argentina’s floating terminals.
