LNG giant Shell has completed the first liquefied natural gas bunkering operation in the Caribbean with the 18,000-cbm bunkering vessel, New Frontier 2.
In July, Shell and South Korea’s Pan Ocean named this LNG bunkering vessel. South Korea’s Hyundai Mipo built the ship.
Shell’s unit Shell NA LNG previously entered into a six-year charter deal worth about $55 million for the newbuild and Shell said it will deploy the ship in the Americas.
According to a social media post on Monday by Shell’s head of downstream LNG, Tahir Faruqui, the firm has put New Frontier 2 to work in the Caribbean with the completion of its first operation in Jamaica.
The vessel bunkered the oil and chemical tanker Solar Catie during the operation.
Shell joined forces with the Maritime Authority of Jamaica and the Port Authority of Jamaica for this bunkering operation.
Faruqui said this operation also “signified an important milestone for us in Jamaica where we conducted our first ship-to-ship LNG bunkering in Portland Bight.”
Eerlier this year, Shell and Israel’s shipping firm Zim completed the first LNG bunkering operation in Jamaica as part of their 10-year bunkering deal.
This LNG bunkering vessel is Shell’s third ship deployed in the Americas and “is part of our expansive lineup of 12 bunker vessels,” Faruqui added.
Shell has been lately quite busy with its LNG bunkering business.
Last month, the firm started delivering LNG to Hapag-Lloyd’s giant LNG-powered containerships in the Dutch port of Rotterdam under a deal signed earlier this year.
In addition, Shell and its partners recently completed what they say is the first-ever cruise ship LNG bunkering in the port of Gibraltar.
Shell recently also added two more LNG bunkering locations in Europe, Flushing, and Antwerp.
With this, the company expanded its network to 19 locations across 12 countries.
