The rise of Floating Liquefied Natural Gas projects continues despite the current low oil price environment, with Golar LNG the latest to push ahead with a new facility destined for offshore Cameroon.
The company signed a Heads of Agreement (HOA) with the country’s Societe Nationale de Hydrocarbures (SNH) and Perenco Cameroon for the development of a FLNG export project located 20 km offshore Cameroon utilizing Golar’s floating liquefaction technology GoFLNG.
The HOA is based on the allocation of 500 Bcf of gas reserves from the Kribi fields, to be exported to global markets via the GoFLNG facility Golar Hilli, under construction at Keppel’s shipyard in Singapore. Golar is to provide the liquefaction facilities and services under a tolling agreement to SNH and Perenco as owners of the upstream joint venture, who also intend to produce LPG for the local market. Production is anticipated to be around 1.2 million tonnes of LNG per annum over an approximate eight year period.
Definitive commercial agreements will be executed and necessary licenses and approvals secured during the first half of this year for the production, liquefaction, and export of the reserves, so that production can begin during the first half of 2017.
Golar also executed agreements for the speculative conversion of the 125,000 m3 Moss LNG carrier Golar Gimi into a second FLNGV facility. The primary contract for this unit was also entered into with Keppel, which simultaneously entered into a sub-contract with Black & Veatch to provide its licensed PRICO® technology, perform detailed engineering and process design, specify and procure topside equipment, and provide commissioning support for the topsides and liquefaction process. These agreements all closely mirror those done for the conversion of the Golar Hilli executed last year.
The Gimi will be delivered to Keppel in the second quarter of this year. Golar expects the conversion to be completed and delivered in approximately 33 months.
Keppel says the conversion contract is worth about US $705 million in total, and is the first of two options Golar has with the yard.