Combined LNG services offered at LNG reloading station in Klaipeda
The second LNG shipment for PGNiG, a partner oil and gas company in Poland, arrives at the KN (SC Klaipėdos Nafta) Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) reloading station at the port of Klaipėda on August 26. Darius Šilenskis, the General Manager of KN, says that the LNG distribution reloading station has had a breakthrough year for providing combined LNG services.
The shipment for PGNiG, which contains approximately 3.2 thousand m3 of LNG, is being delivered by an LNG bunkering vessel Coralius to the port of Klaipėda for the first time. This ship was built in 2017 and carries the Swedish flag. It is one of the three LNG bunkering vessels serving LNG terminals and completing bunkering operations in the Baltic and Scandinavian markets.
KN, the operator of oil and LNG terminals, has entered into a five-year strategic partnership agreement with the Polish oil and gas company PGNiG in November last year and in April 2020 PGNiG started its operations in Klaipėda.
“Our activities in Lithuania in the use of the local LNG reloading station are gaining momentum, and the cooperation with Klaipėdos Nafta is excellent. In less than five months, we received two LNG loads, and over 100 tank trucks loaded with liquefied natural gas have already left the station. It is over 1,800 tons of LNG, which equals over 27,000 MWh” - said Jerzy Kwieciński, President of the PGNiG Management Board.
“Our strategic decision to establish cooperation with PGNiG brings tangible results to the development of the activities at the LNG reloading station. The Polish LNG consumption market is already sufficiently broad and involves the use of LNG in the transport sector as well as the supply of LNG to customers who are distant from the natural gas network. On the other hand, as owners of an infrastructure in the port of Klaipėda, we receive enquiries from various companies in the marine sector regarding the possibility of bunkering LNG-powered vessels or replenishing the capacity of LNG-powered trucks. There is still a lot of work to be done in this area, in terms of adjusting port shipping rules and port charges, as well as promoting LNG infrastructural development projects at public level in order to motivate the market," said Darius Šilenskis, CEO of KN.
According to D. Šilenskis, bunkering of the LNG-powered cement-shipping vessel Greenland has become a regular operation in the port of Klaipėda this year. The ship is bunkered in Malkų Įlankos Terminalas by supplying LNG in an ISO container, which is filled at the LNG reloading station. Since the first bunkering operation of this kind in March this year, ten further LNG transshipments have been carried out.
“LNG bunkering of ships is becoming a common practice in the port of Klaipėda. We hope to attract other types of ships powered by LNG, such as container ships, oil tankers or cruise ships to fuel up with LNG at the reloading station in Klaipėda or, as in the case of the cement-shipping vessel Greenland, elsewhere in the port of Klaipėda. It must be understood that users are only drawn to such a service if it is competitive in all aspects: the price of the service must be attractive, and the conditions of entering and staying at the port must also be favorable," notes D. Šilenskis.
