Air Products said it will be making a “significant” investment to meet industry demand with increased winding capacity at its LNG equipment manufacturing facility located in Port Manatee, Florida.
According to a statement by the US LNG equipment specialist, the firm expects that this increase in capacity, coupled with new proprietary innovations in fabrication methods, will enable Air Products to improve equipment delivery schedules.
Winding is a fabrication process for the internal components of coil-wound heat exchangers (CWHE) in which layers of tubes are wound around a central mandrel.
Air Products said this investment will increase its manufacturing capacity by almost 20 percent.
Moreover, this follows a previous expansion which the company completed in 2019 and that increased the facility’s original capacity by 60 percent.
The company opened its LNG equipment manufacturing facility in Port Manatee in January 2014 and rolled out its first LNG heat exchanger from the facility in September 2016. It has shipped over 20 CWHEs since.
Air Products recently won a contract to provide equipment for QatarEnergy’s North Field South (NFS) LNG project.
Prior to this deal, Air Products secured contracts for the North Field East LNG project in Ras Laffan, Qatar, the first expansion phase.