Excelerate Energy’s 150,900-cbm FSRU Exemplar, which serves Gasgrid’s import facility in Inkoo, has started supplying regasified LNG to the grid as part of the commissioning phase.
First supplies from the FSRU-based Inkoo LNG terminal were delivered to the Finnish gas grid on December 29, just a day after Exemplar docked at the newly built jetty in Inkoo, according to Gasgrid.
The FSRU was previously loaded with a partial cargo of LNG which will serve as the initial commissioning cargo for the Inkoo terminal.
It took the cargo sourced from Excelerate’s global LNG portfolio via a ship-to-ship transfer with the FSRU Excelsior near Gibraltar, Excelerate previously said.
The US firm also said that its unit had signed a deal for the sale of commissioning volumes and regasification capacity rights during the commissioning phase.
Through this agreement, Excelerate Finland would be able to provide natural gas to downstream customers in Finland and other Baltic countries, it said.
Besides the partial cargo, it appears that the FSRU has also received its first LNG tanker.
The 174,130-cbm LNG carrier, Isabella, owned by Maran Gas and chartered by Equinor, delivered a cargo on January 1, according to its AIS data provided by VesselsValue.
Isabella previously loaded the cargo at Cheniere’s Sabine Pass LNG terminal in the US, the data shows.
Commercial ops in January
The FSRU Exemplar, which can supply more than 5 billion cubic meters per year of regasification capacity, will serve Finland and other Baltic states under a 10-year charter deal Gasgrid signed with Excelerate in May.
Gasgrid has leased the 291 meters long and 43 meters wide Exemplar for a total cost of 460 million euros ($493 million).
Floating LNG Terminal Finland (FLTF), a unit of Gasgrid and the operator of the FSRU-based terminal, has already invited market participants to submit offers for a total of seven capacity slots for the first quarter this year and also for the April-September period.
Gasgrid expects to launch commercial operations at the facility in mid-January.
Besides this first FSRU-based terminal in Finland, Hamina LNG launched commercial operations in October at its small LNG import terminal in Finland’s Hamina port.
Hamina LNG provides storage services from one 30,000-cbm LNG tank as well as regasification and injection services into the Finnish gas transmission network with a daily capacity of 4,800 MWh.
(Article updated to say that the 174,130-cbm LNG carrier, Isabella, has delivered a cargo to the FSRU.)