LNG Water-Borne Refueling Station Brings new Opportunity for Chinese Ship Enterprises

Over recent years,increasingly progressive gas fuel engine and double-fuel engine technology has laid a technical foundation for future upgrading of civil ship power plant, and global oil price hike in future is expected to further narrow down price spread of LNG and fuel oil. In the wake of increasing dry-up of global petroleum resources and increasing stringency of maritime environmental requirement,LNG represented gas fuel will gradually replace fuel oil to become the main fuel of ships.Compared with fuel oil, gas fuel frequently has higher risk in the course of storage and transport,and this means future gas fuel refueling will take a totally different pattern from current fuel oil refueling.

Compared with shore-based LNG refueling station, waterborne LNG refueling station layout is more flexible,minimizing unfavorable effect of any possible accident on nearby city and industrial facilities, superior to shorebased LNG refueling station design scheme at large. From technical perspective, sea-borne LNG refueling station will very likely become the main LNG fuel make-up pattern in future and this is very rare opportunity for the Chinese shipbuilding industry.

Floating sea-borne LNG refueling station construction involves a fairly low threshold and it is in essence a barge equipped with LNG refueling equipment. Therefore, most shipyards can undertake the job of main hull and fuel storage tank installation and future construction market will be fairly open. For a floating refueling station, as restrained by LNG storage tank space, refueling station unit displacement carries limited fuel, it can only make up in quantity, easy for serialized construction, a shipyard can more easily realize profit here. For new barge, a barge reconstructed from an old ship as a floating LNG refueling station is a fine choice.Affected by global capacity surplus and BWM Convention entry into force, many global cargo ships face the possibility of ahead-of-schedule dismantling.In relation to other locations of a ship, double bottom of less than 20-year ship will not face grave overall erosion,after sight repair, it can be used as the platform of an LNG refueling station. Therefore,floating LNG refueling station features simple technology, low construction threshold, future fierce market competition, and shipyards of good cost control and production management will win out more easily.

Compared with floating LNG refueling station with barge as platform, semi-submersible LNG refueling station construction