US builds its LNG bunkering infrastructure

LNG America, a Houston-based LNG fuel supply and distribution company formed only last July, is planning to position a number of LNG bunker barges around the Gulf coast.

They are due for delivery in late 2015, but no yard had been appointed at the time of writing in late March. Nor had the number of ships; one to four, Fuels Lubes & Emissions Technology was advised by their designer, Jensen Maritime, a Seattle-based naval architecture and marine engineering company that is part of Crowley Maritime Corp.

When the contract was announced in February, there were no LNG bunkering barges operating in US waters so these are among the first to be developed and built, marking a significant step in developing LNG bunkering infrastructure in the US, encouraged by the fuel’s price competitiveness resulting from the abundant US natural gas reserves that are now being developed.

The vessels have an initial planned capacity of up to 3,000m³ of LNG, Jensen Marine reported, and will have two roles: to provide bunkers to large ships and to move LNG from LNG America’s Louisiana supply source to coastal-based storage and distribution terminals.

LNG America’s CEO, Keith Meyer, anticipates growing demand for LNG bunkers and said that it would be robust, “as long as LNG can be made available to the maritime industry on a reliable, dependable and cost-competitive basis.” So his intention is to “deliver competitively priced LNG as fuel where needed, when needed and in the quantity needed.”

In a newspaper interview, Mr Meyer said that negotiations were in hand to source the gas from the Sabine Pass Terminal in Louisiana, which is operated by Cheniere Energy. It is clear from LNG America’s website that the company has broader plans to supply fuel in other parts of the US. “LNG America will deliver LNG where needed, when needed, and in the quantity needed,” its overview reports.

“Starting from a base on the Gulf Coast, LNG America will provide LNG through a network of LNG transportation and storage assets enabling the major fuel consumption markets to reliably obtain LNG for fuel,” it says. And those markets include the marine industry and the oil exploration and production industry, along with onshore consumers such as railway, mining, trucking and mining.

To achieve this, it explains, its storage and logistics network will include LNG bunkering and shuttle vessels “enabling us to deliver to all major ports and directly bunker a large marine vessel.”

As far as port-based LNG bunkering facilities are concerned, these are expected to be developed in conjunction with export terminals. US shipowners are specifying LNG fuelling for a number of newbuildings and conversions, so they are clearly confident that the bunkering infrastructure will be in place.

The April/May issue of Marine Propulsion reported that LNG suppliers are prepared to invest in the necessary fuelling arrangements to be part of this emerging shipping segment; a number of terminals that currently serve the LNG import market are being provided with gas liquefaction trains to make them suitable for LNG export, which will be suitable also for producing LNG bunker fuel.

However, the first LNG bunkering station in the USA is expected to be associated with a specific shipping project: a series of six 5,250 dwt offshore support vessel (OSV) newbuildings under construction at the TY Offshore yard in Gulfport, Mississippi, for Harvey Gulf International Marine.

Delivery of the first, Harvey Energy, is due this year when it will become the first LNG-fuelled vessel that is not an LNG carrier to be delivered by a US shipbuilder. Three of the ships will have LNG tanks supplied by Lockheed Martin, which is also building six 350m³ pressure vessel LNG storage tanks for the bunkering facility that Harvey Gulf is building at its Port Fourchon OSV vessel base in Louisiana. This facility, which is due for completion later this year, will be the first LNG bunkering station in the USA. FLET