ShareLNG is expected to meet 24% of global bunker fuel supply by 2025
Lloyd’s global marketing manager announced the statistics gathered from an ‘LNG Bunkering Infrastructural Survey’ conducted earlier this year. It has been suggested that LNG will account for 13% of the global bunker fuel market by 2020, increasing to 24% in 2025.
Out of the 50 ports surveyed around the world, 22 responded to a questionnaire organised to better understand the scope of how LNG will influence the maritime industry in the coming years.
15 ports were located in Europe, four in North America and a final three in Asia. Upon a review of the 18 questions answered by each port, Lloyd’s found that 59 percent already had specific plans for developing the LNG bunkering infrastructure, whilst 76 percent believed that LNG bunkering will commence at the port in the next five years.
More importantly, results found that European ports felt they would be able to support deep-sea bunkering operations by 2020. As of this moment in time LNG bunkering is limited to short-sea vessels.
Nevertheless, 90 percent of the ports agreed that safety protocols between land and sea would first need to be finalised before any major developments could take place
Lloyd’s global marketing manager also suggested that Singapore would pioneer the drive for LNG in Asia since it already has the facilities needed for such a process.
However, there is already some major divergence in prices between North America, Europe and Asia. Currently, Asian LNG prices are hovering around USD 15.40/MMBtu (USD 4512/Kwh); rather steep when compared to UK’s USD 7.908/MMBtu (2,317,044/Kwh) and the US’s Louisiana Henry Hub which stands at USD 4.436/MMBtu (USD 1,299,748/Kwh).
Source : www.porttechnology.org