State-owned DET expects the 174,000-cbm FSRU Energos Force to arrive at the AVG jetty in Germany’s Stade on Friday.
The FSRU is on its way from Rotterdam where minor work was carried out to convert the ship from cargo operation to FSRU operation.
The German LNG terminal operator said in a statement on Thursday the vessel is expected to arrive at the AVG jetty in the industrial port of Stade-Bützfleth at around 7.30am local time on March 15.
The almost 300 meters long ship, operated by DET, will undergo several weeks of test operations before being able to feed up to 5 bcm of gas per year into the German gas network, thereby making a “significant” contribution to security of supply and gas price stability in Germany and Europe, it said.
A spokesman for DET told LNG Prime that the arrival date of the commissioning cargo for the FSRU-based terminal has not yet been determined.
This is the third of DET’s four FSRU-based LNG terminals following the launch of the Brunsbüttel and Wilhelmshaven 1 terminals.
DET also expects commissioning to start at the its second terminal in Wilhelmshaven at the end of the second quarter of 2024.
Peter Röttgen, managing director of DET, said this third DET liquefied natural gas import is also “an important step for many companies that, despite technical efforts, are still dependent on large quantities of natural gas for the time being.”
“After all, industrial and commercial companies need planning security. LNG provides the needed economic stability today and is a basis for the transition to climate-neutral production. This will also affect many thousands of jobs today and in the future,” he said.
Energos Force
In December last year, the FSRU left Germany’s Bremerhaven and since then it has been serving as an LNG carrier.
The 2021-built FSRU, previously known as Transgas Force, was recently purchased by Apollo’s Energos Infrastructure from Greece’s Dynagas.
Energos Infrastructure will be responsible for the regasification at the FSRU, while coordination of LNG carrier berthing, gas flows and reporting will be managed by Lithuania’s KN Energies on behalf of DET, the company said.
Harbor structures on the water side were built by port operator Niedersachsen Ports.
Also, DET had commissioned Hanseatic Energy Hub (HEH), which is working on the onshore Stade LNG terminal, to build the superstructure.
HEH will continue to work on behalf of DET at the FSRU, taking over services for technical operation and maintenance in cooperation with DOW, it said.
During winter, the FSRU can regasify a maximum of 500 million standard cubic feet of gas per day (MMSCFD) in a closed cycle with steam boilers, according to DET.
DET said that during summer, regasification capacity can be raised up to 750 MMSCFD in an open cycle utilizing seawater.
Energos Force’s expected annual sendout capacity of up to five bcm of gas represents the so-called DTRS value (declared total reference sendout).
This refers to the maximum technically possible system send-out under ideal conditions, meaning that neither extreme weather conditions nor technical restrictions will reduce the amount of gas fed into the German gas grid, DET noted.
Nevertheless, lower sendouts due to the actual size of the delivered cargoes have to be taken into account, it said.
In December, DET allocated 11 regasification slots at its upcoming Stade terminal and it just postponed capacity allocations planned for April.