China Merchants Jinling Shipyard in Weihai has started building the third of six LNG-powered pure car and truck carriers for Idan Ofer’s Eastern Pacific Shipping.
To mark the construction start, the yard held a steel-cutting ceremony on April 17 for the vessel with a working name W0302, according to a statement.
The six vessels will have a capacity of 7000 units, 199.9 meters in length, and a designed draft of 8.6 meters.
With a gross tonnage of 72,000, they will have a designed speed of 19.5 knots and 12 cargo decks in total.
Also, these PCTCs will feature a high-pressure dual-fuel engine and two sets of 2000-cbm LNG storage tanks, according to the Chinese shipbuilder.
In August last year, the shipbuilder started building the first vessel in this batch, followed by the steel-cutting for the second in November.
VesselsValue data shows that EPS will pay about $87 for each of these six vessels and take delivery of them during 2024-2025.
Besides these six ships, EPS also has LNG-powered PCTCs on order at China Merchants Jinling Shipyard in Jiangsu.