The 174,000-cbm LNG carrier, Umm Ghuwailina, owned by Japan’s MOL and chartered by QatarEnergy, has completed its sea and gas trials, according to China’s Hudong-Zhonghua.
Hudong-Zhonghua said in a statement issued on Wednesday that the vessel returned to the yard after completing the “two-in-one” trial.
The shipbuilder said this is the second LNG carrier MOL ordered as part of the giant QatarEnergy project.
In January last year, the CSSC-controlled shipbuilder officially started building this vessel (H1791A).
State-run LNG giant QatarEnergy signed charter deals in April 2022 for these four LNG carriers with MOL, completing the first batch of charter contracts awarded under its massive shipbuilding program.
The vessels, part of Hudong-Znoghua’s fifth-generation Changxeng series, are 299 meters long and 46.4 meters wide.
Also, the LNG carriers feature a reliquefaction system as well.
The first vessel in this batch of four ships is the 174,000-cbm LNG carrier, Rex Tillerson.
QatarEnergy said in a statement in February this year that it has named the first LNG carrier to be delivered as part of its new LNG fleet expansion program Rex Tillerson in recognition of the former chairman and CEO of US energy giant ExxonMobil, who also served as the 69th US Secretary of State.
The firm said that the LNG carrier is expected to be put in service in September 2024.
It is a part of a 12-ship construction program at Hudong-Zhonghua that makes up the first batch of orders from China in QatarEnergy’s shipbuilding program.
Besides these vessels, QatarEnergy has signed a major shipbuilding deal in April this year worth $6 billion with China State Shipbuilding Corp for the construction of 18 271,000-cbm LNG carriers at Hudong-Zhonghua.