Germany: chancellor announces construction of two LNG terminals

 In the light of the russian invasion into Ukraine german chancellor Olaf Scholz operates a reversal of the german energy policy. In a government declaration chancellor Scholz announced alongside a considerable raise of the defefense spendung also the construction of two LNG terminals, namely in Wilhelmshaven and Brunsbuttel where terminals never got beyond the project phase. WELT:

Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) has announced a massive increase in German defense spending in response to the Russian attack on Ukraine.

The 2022 federal budget should be provided with a one-time special fund of 100 billion euros for “necessary investments and armament projects”, said Scholz in his government statement on Sunday in the Bundestag. He added: "From now on we will invest more than two percent of the gross domestic product in our defense every year."

To reduce dependence on Russian natural gas, Scholz announced the construction of two liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminals in Germany, naming Brunsbüttel and Wilhelmshaven in Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony as locations. In addition, a coal and gas reserve should be built up.

An LNG terminal that receives gas today can also receive green hydrogen tomorrow, said Scholz. Although there are many terminals for liquefied natural gas in the EU, which comes from the USA or Qatar, for example, there have not been any in Germany so far.

Germany: Uniper stops construction of FSRU Wilhelmshaven

Concerns about a sufficient workload of the planned FSRU confirmed by the paucity of prospective clients willing to book capacities le to the decision to put the project on hold, meanwhile the building works to complete the Nord Stream 2 pipeline have been resumed, writes german newspaper WELT:

Politicians are often sales geniuses, and this is particularly true of the incumbent US President: Donald Trump once advertised American natural gas on the world market as "Freedom Gas". The fuel extracted with the controversial "fracking" method should help to free the countries of the world from the dependence on Russian oil and gas monopolists.

The oil and gas business has always been highly politicized and is still at the center of geostrategic planning by the great powers. It was probably not due to purely economic considerations that Germany started building three liquefied gas ports on the North Sea coast a few years ago.

Frozen liquid gas, also known as LNG, delivered by tanker was intended to limit the market power of the main European supplier, Russia, in natural gas. The EU Commission also considered this to be sensible.

Wilhemshaven FSRU is taking shape

MarineLog writes:

"Mitsui O.S.K. Lines Ltd. (MOL) and LNG Terminal Wilhelmshaven (LTW) have signed an agreement to build and charter a 263,000 cu.m LNG Floating Storage and Regasification Unit (FSRU) for the planned LNG terminal in Wilhelmshaven, which is Germany’s only deep water port and can be reached without any tidal constraints.

The FSRU will be built by South Korean’s Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering (DSME) then chartered by LTW (which is a subsidiary of Düsseldorf headquartered Uniper SE) for 20 years.

DSME said in a filing last week that it had signed a contract worth $340 million to build an FSRU for an undisclosed customer.

The FSRU will make it possible to offload, store and regasify LNG for the German market. It will be moored off the coast not far from Wilhelmshaven and will handle incoming LNG tankers there. The regasified gas will then be pumped from the FSRU along a short connecting pipeline under the sea to the port facilities and finally fed into the German gas transmission network. This eliminates the need to construct complex regasification facilities on land."

 You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

https://www.marinelog.com/shipping/markets/wilhelmshaven-fsru-to-be-built-by-dsme/