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    Bloomberg: Cheap Oil Doesn’t Deter Japan Shipbuilders From Betting on LNG

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Summary

At a shipyard in southern Japan, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. engineers envision the newest fuel-efficient engines for liquefied natural gas carriers while others design tanks with greater capacity.

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Bloomberg: Cheap Oil Doesn’t Deter Japan Shipbuilders From Betting on LNG

At a shipyard in southern Japan, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. engineers envision the newest fuel-efficient engines for liquefied natural gas carriers while others design tanks with greater capacity.

Years after South Korean rivals became the world’s largest shipbuilders, the Japanese stand at the cusp of clawing back some of the industry they once dominated.

LNG is the catalyst. With several projects around the globe set to begin shipping in the next few years and Japan already the largest importer of the super-cooled fuel, Japan shipbuilders are anticipating a windfall. And while lower oil prices are threatening the viability of some LNG projects, some remain convinced the industry’s growing pains are mere road bumps in a longer game and that their advances in technology provide an edge.

“The wind is in the sails of Japan’s shipbuilders,” said Nobutaka Nambu, chief executive officer at World Ships Future, a consultant for the shipbuilding and shipping industries in Tokyo. “They are now placed to take a step forward. They are now in a position to make a dent in the Koreans’ oligopoly.”
 
LNG trade is set to exceed $120 billion this year, overtaking iron ore to become the most valuable physical commodity after oil, analysts from Goldman Sachs Group Inc., including Jeffrey Currie, said in an e-mailed report recently. MORE

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