Japan’s Saibu Gas said it has started a year-round delivery of LNG via ISO containers to China’s Jusda Energy Technology.
The city gas supplier loaded the first batch of ISO containers on April 16 at the Japanese Hibiki container terminal in the Port of Kitakyushu in Fukuoka prefecture.
Prior to placing the containers onboard a dedicated containership, Saibu Gas loaded them onto trucks at its Hibiki receiving terminal located in Kitakyushu, the northernmost city on Japan’s Kyushu Island.
Saibu Gas said it would ship about 59,000 tons of LNG in total to China’s Shandong province over the one-year period spanning from April 2021 to March 2022.
It plans to load about 100 ISO containers per shipment or about 1,800 tons of LNG.
In addition, the Japanese firm says it has already delivered about 10,000 tons of LNG in ISO containers to Shanghai-based Jusda, owned by Foxconn and IDG Energy Investment, from December to April. Jusda supplies the fuel to various end-users in China.
To remind, Russia’s Novatek said in December it had joined forces with Saibu Gas to complete its first trial delivery of LNG shipped in ISO containers to the world’s largest energy consumer China.
The duo delivered the shipment in Tiger Gas-owned ISO containers from the Hibiki container terminal to Shanghai.
China has been steadily increasing its LNG imports over the years and they hit an all-time high last year rising 11.5 percent to 67.13 million tonnes. China should also overtake Japan as the world’s largest LNG importer this year or the next as the country continues its switch to cleaner fuels.