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PGNiG starts small-scale LNG operations in Lithuania
POLAND
Poland’s PGNiG has sold its first two LNG cargoes from the reloading station in Klaipeda, Lithuania, which it started using on April 1.
POLAND’S PGNiG has sold its first two LNG cargoes from the reloading station in Klaipeda, Lithuania, which it started using on April 1. The Polish company is the sole user of the small-scale reloading station, having won the tender for its exclusive use in November 2019.
The two LNG trucks were loaded on April 7, and both cargoes were purchased by Norway’s CRYO Shipping, a bunker fuel supplier for LNG-fuelled ships. The two LNG cargoes that were bought from PGNiG were used to bunker the Greenland, a cement carrier moored at the Port of Klaipeda, which is owned by Norway’s JT Cement.
“Despite the challenging market conditions caused by the coronavirus [COVID-19] pan- demic, it took us only a week to launch our oper- ations in Klaipeda,” the president of PGNiG’s management board, Jerzy Kwieciński, said in a statement. “On the one hand this attests to our capabilities in small-scale LNG, while also confirming that the LNG markets in Lithuania and the other Baltic countries have considerable potential,” he added.
The reloading station has five tanks with a total capacity of 5,000 cubic metres (2,250 tonnes) of LNG. It has two loading stations for LNG trucks and ISO containers, which can be used simultaneously. It also has a wharf, allow- ing it to both receive LNG from vessels and to load the fuel. It can thus be used for bunkering by ships powered by LNG.
The facility entered service in October 2017, and its LNG volumes grew 45% year on year between 2018 and 2019. Over two years the sta- tion has been in operation, 12 companies from Lithuania, Estonia and Poland have used it to fill LNG-fuelled trucks. During this period, 44,000
cubic metres of LNG has been delivered to the facility by small-scale gas carriers.
When PGNiG took over operations at the reloading station last week, Kwieciński noted that his company was aiming to expand its small- scale LNG operations in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia – the entire Baltic region. The company also supplies LNG to customers in Germany and the Czech Republic.
“The launch of operations by PGNiG in Klaipėda required making numerous com- plex trading and operating arrangements,” Kwieciński said.
PGNiG has a five-year contract covering the use of the reloading facility with Lithuania’s Klaipedos Nafta (KN). The Lithuanian company also operates a floating storage and regasifica- tion unit (FSRU), the Independence, in the Port of Klaipeda, and has been trying to establish a small-scale LNG regional Baltic hub.
“We are positive that co-operation between KN and PGNiG will significantly contribute to strengthening of the regional small-scale LNG market,”KN’s CEO, Darius Šilenskis, stated last week. “Together with our partners, we will strive to intensify its development, which will provide opportunities for more competitive prices and will enable LNG to be widely used by customers in Baltic States, North-Eastern Poland and Cen- tral and Eastern Europe.”
Indeed, PGNiG believes that customers from North-Eastern Poland could see cost benefits if they opt to receive their LNG from Lithuania rather than domestically. In Poland, LNG can be sourced from the President Lech Kaczyński Terminal in Świnoujście, as well as PGNiG’s production plants in Odolanów and Grodzisk Wielkopolski, in the province of Wielkopolska.™
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