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The Eemshaven LNG hub consists of two chartered floating storage and regasification units – the 170,000-cbm FSRU Energos Igloo, owned by Energos Infrastructure, and the 26,000-cbm barge-based FSRU Eemshaven LNG, owned by Exmar.
It is the first FSRU-based terminal in the Netherlands and the second LNG import terminal in the country after Gate.
The LNG hub has a nameplate capacity of 8 billion cubic meters and supplies natural gas to capacity holders UK-based Shell, Czech utility CEZ, and France’s Engie.
Shell booked 4 bcm per year of the capacity, CEZ reserved 3 bcm per year, and Engie booked the rest.
US LNG shipments
According to shipment data provided by Gasunie to LNG Prime, the 123 LNG cargoes received since September 2022 total 10.8 bcm.
Last year, the LNG hub received 42 cargoes (3.7 bcm). This compares to 68 cargoes in 2023 (5.9 bcm) and 11 cargoes (1 bcm) in September-December 2022.
The Emshaven LNG hub received its 100th cargo in June 2024.
Entsog and GIE data show that flows from the LNG hub to the grid have been low since October last year.
Also, the FSRU-based facility received only two cargoes up to date in 2025.
Looking at the sources of the shipments, the majority of the supplies came from US terminals.
Last year, the Eemshaven LNG hub received most of the shipments from Cheniere’s Sabine Pass and Corpus Christi terminals.
It also imported cargoes from the Elba Island terminal, the Cove Point facility, the Freeport terminal, Trinidad, and Peru.
Capacity, no maintenance this year
Gasunie previously said that EemsEnergyTerminal will increase its capacity by “technical optimization” of the existing installations, including debottlenecking.
“Technically, EemsEnergyTerminal can transmit 10 bcm,” a Gasunie spokeswoman told LNG Prime.
“However, actual throughput depends on market demand. Currently, this demand is not yet present,” she said.
The spokeswoman also said that EemsEnergyTerminal, the operator of the terminal, is not planning to conduct maintenance this year.
However, this remains subject to “unforeseen circumstances.”
Eemshaven LNG extension
Last year, Gasunie and Vopak, together with the Dutch Ministry of Climate Policy and Green Growth (formerly the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy), announced that they would look into the possibility of keeping the Eemshaven terminal in operation longer.
Currently, the LNG import contracts will end in the second half of 2027.
The partners recently said they plan to decide to extend LNG imports beyond 2027 at the end of this year.
Gasunie and Vopak launched an open season to market terminal capacity following “strong interest” by parties in the market consultation last year.
“We started the open season a few weeks ago. At this moment there is a lot of interest from the market,” the Gasunie spokeswoman said.
She said that the partners plan to launch the binding phase in the upcoming period.
“I think we will announce more in June,” the spokeswoman said.