Cepsa To Improve LNG Bunker Offer
Spanish refiner Cepsa said September 16 it will supply LNG to ships through Europe’s first multi-product bunkering barge, expected to start operations in 2018 from the Port of Barcelona.
The supply barge will be able to provide all types of marine fuels from traditional ones like diesel through to very low emissions ones like LNG. Cepsa and its partner, Spanish shipowner Suardiaz, will work together to design and build the new barge.
“Customers will benefit from the great flexibility that the barge will give,” said Cepsa bunker director Alberto Martínez-Lacaci: “Cepsa is a bunker leader in Spain and supplies marine fuels in other important international ports such as Fujairah and Panama so had to be involved in this project.”
The project is part of the EU's Core LNGas Hive initiative, which includes coordinator Spanish gas grid and LNG terminals operator Enagas, along with Cepsa and 40 other partners in Spain and Portugal.
from left to right: Juan Riva, General Director of Suardíaz Lines and Rafael Rolo, Technical Fleet Director Suardíaz, alongside Juan Antonio Vera, Cepsa COO, Alfonso Mingarro, Director of Cepsa Trading, Alberto Martínez-Lacaci, Cepsa Bunker director; Daniel de Miguel, Cepsa's head of operations and quality for Cepsa Bunker, and Inigo Diaz de Espada, head of Cepsa's communications (Photo credit: Cepsa)
Cepsa is wholly-owned by Abu Dhabi state-run International Petroleum Investment Company (IPIC).
Suardiaz Lines already has nine roll-on, roll-off ferries and two traditional bunkering ships.
Enagas runs the Barcelona LNG terminal, near the port, and several others dotted around the coast of Spain. On June 1, its CEO Marcelino Oreja and Port of Barcelona president Sixte Cambra signed an agreement jointly to make the port an LNG distribution hub for the Mediterranean.
Enagas also owns a company called Gascan that aims to develop two mini LNG terminals in the Canary Islands, a key Cepsa refining and bunkering base. Elsewhere on September 15, Enagas completed the first of two deals announced in June to boost its stake in the Chile’s Quintero LNG terminal; it now has 40.4%; once the second is completed it will reach 60.4%.
Mark Smedley