Klaipedos Nafta and Bomin Linde LNG Create JV to Lease Bunker Supply Vessel

To address a current surplus of gas at the Klaipeda LNG terminal, Lithuania has decided to lease a LNG bunker supply vessel to cater to gas marine customers.

To achieve that end, this week Klaipedos Nafta, operator of the LNG facility, and Germany’s Bomin Linde LNG GmbH&Co have established a joint venture, called Blue LNG, to implement the €27 million LNG Bunker Supply Vessel project .

Hamburg-based Bomin Linde LNG will hold 80% of the shares in the joint venture, while 20% will belong to SGD logistika, a fully owned subsidiary of Klaipedos Nafta. Initial capital of the new venture is reported to be €200,000 (US$212,628).

Last week, the board of Klaipedos Nafta decided on a fee to lease the bunker supply vessel. However, that figure has not been released with officials citing commercial confidentiality as the reason for the omission.

The board members have also pledged a financial guarantee of $14 million (USD) for the new venture.

Klaipedos Nafta says the LNG Bunker Supply Vessel project will be solely funded with Klaipedos Nafta and EU money; no budgetary resources or fees from the gas consumers’ tariff will be used, it said. 

The vessel, which has a capacity of 6,500 cubic metres (cbm), is expected to become operational in 2017 and will serve several functions. First, it will supply the marine customers of Bomin Linde LNG with liquefied natural gas as ship fuel. Second, it will act as a secure LNG transport service to the LNG reloading station of Klaipedos Nafta. Third, it will offer further LNG transportation services, transporting the fuel to small-scale LNG terminals in the Baltic and North Sea.

“This agreement means that Bomin Linde LNG, which is the leading supplier of marine LNG in Northwest Europe, and Klaipedos Nafta, as operator of the first LNG terminal in the Baltic Sea, are joining forces to extend Klaipeda as LNG hub in the region," Mantas Bartuška, General Manager of Klaipedos Nafta, said after the signing. "The Klaipeda LNG terminal which is already in operation and the soon-to-be-built LNG reloading station will be connected by the LNG Bunker Supply Vessel operated by Blue LNG.”  

Meanwhile, Mahinde Abeynaike, Managing Director of Bomin Linde LNG, expressed hope that partnership with Klaipedos Nafta will eventually make Klaipeda a hub for the German company, enabling it to efficiently supply LNG to the Baltic Sea ports and other North Western European locations.

Richard Schroder, Bomin Linde LNG director of commerce, said recently he believes that Lithuania’s FSRU Independence should become the most important LNG facility in the Baltic Sea.

“In approximately five years, there should be in operation in the [Baltic] sea 10-15 small LNG terminals, all of which would be supplied with liquefied natural gas from Klaipeda,” he was quoted as saying.

However, in a press conference Tuesday, Lithuanian officials hinted that the new company may not necessarily be buying gas from the LNG terminal Klaipeda.

“We will buy gas where it is cheapest,” a Lithuanian official said.

Bomn Linde Managing Director Mahinde Abeynaike, however, said if regulation allowed and if the price were commercially attractive, the company would consider Klaipeda LNG purchases.

Bound by contract with Statoil, Lithuania is obligated to purchase 540 million cubic metres of gas annually from the Norwegian company. However, at present, the Baltic country consumes only around 30% of that amount leaving it with a surplus of around 70% of the contracted gas amount.