Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement (BSM) and Babcock International are forming a joint venture, Babcock Schulte Energy (BSE), to support their first LNG bunker-supply ship project and to develop other ventures together.
The two companies have ordered their first LNG bunker-supply ship for charter to Blue LNG, the joint venture between the restructured Linde Group and Klaipedos Nafta to be based at the Port of Klaipeda, sourcing LNG from the floating storage and regasification unit Independence.
BSE is a 50-50 partnership between BSM and Babcock. Together, they have ordered the 7,500m³ gas-supply vessel (GSV) from South Korea-based Hyundai Mipo in Ulsan for delivery in September next year.
The vessel is the sixth purpose-built LNG bunker-supply ship booked to date. It will be the first to feature Babcock’s FGDV0 technology.
This will enable the GSV to supply LNG to the receiving vessel “with zero emissions to the environment during normal operations, greatly minimising [the] environmental impact” of ship-to-ship transfers.
Babcock and BSM are partners with ExxonMobil, Calor Gas and Orkney Islands Council in the Caledonia LNG project, launched in November to explore LNG demand in Scotland.
Caledonia LNG is looking to develop Orkney as an LNG-supply hub. BSM director energy projects Angus Campbell told LNG World Shipping that Caledonia LNG will look at demand for ship-based supplies of LNG to industrial and marine customers, notably cruise ships and ferries serving the Scottish isles.
Last year, 127 cruise ships called into Orkney and more are booked this year. Orkney Island Council manages 29 piers and harbours, including Scapa Flow oil terminal.
Caledonia LNG has launched FEED studies to calculate the business case for an LNG hub in Orkney to serve a hinterland spanning Scotland, the North Sea and the Irish Sea. It is looking to develop Hatston Ferry Terminal, three miles outside Kirkwall, as a supply base.
The Hyundai Mipo ship order comes with one option.
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Source: LNG World Shipping
