One day earlier than planned, the gas importer Uniper started commissioning the first German import terminal for liquefied natural gas (LNG) in Wilhelmshaven. According to the Düsseldorf-based company, the first gas was fed into the newly built connection pipeline from the terminal ship “Höegh Esperanza” on Wednesday morning shortly after 9 a.m.
“The fact that the first gas is already flowing through our LNG terminal in Wilhelmshaven is further proof of the determination with which everyone involved is driving the project forward. The test phase, which should be completed at the end of February, is now beginning,” said Uniper, who is responsible for investment planning Manager Holger Kreetz of the German Press Agency.
Close cooperation between authorities and companies
Originally, Uniper had planned to feed gas into the German gas grid for the first time on December 22nd. According to a Uniper spokesman, the fact that things are going faster now is due to the close cooperation between authorities and companies in the realization of the terminal. Last Saturday, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) opened the terminal together with other leaders of the traffic light government. Uniper operates the terminal with the support of the federal government.
The special ship “Höegh Esperanza” reached Wilhelmshaven last Thursday fully loaded with around 165,000 cubic meters of LNG on board and moored at the newly built jetty. The ship is the technical heart of the terminal, which regasses the liquefied gas that is delivered and pumps it back to shore. According to Uniper, the amount of LNG that the ship has on board is enough to supply 50,000 to 80,000 households in Germany for a year.
According to market reports, the ship will deliver between 15 and 155 gigawatt hours of natural gas into the gas network every day during the commissioning phase. The gas will then also be used to commission the newly built, around 26-kilometer-long connecting pipeline from Wilhelmshaven to Etzel in East Frisia. But then it is also available on the market. Commercial operation of the floating terminal is planned from mid-January with a maximum capacity of around 155 gigawatt hours per day. “The next milestone is the arrival of the first LNG ship in mid-January,” said Kreetz.
Ship arrived with first LNG cargo bound for Lubmin
Meanwhile, a tanker with the first load of liquefied natural gas for the terminal in Lubmin has arrived off Rügen. According to Deutsche Regas, the Seapeak Hispania loaded 140,000 cubic meters of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Egypt. The company announced that she had reached her anchorage east of the island of Rügen in the early hours of Wednesday morning.
Approvals for the commissioning of the LNG terminal in Lubmin are still missing. Deutsche Regas has now applied for trial operation. The Schwerin Environment Minister Till Backhaus (SPD) said at the beginning of the week that the permit for this could be granted in a few days.
The “Seapeak Hispania” is to serve as an interim storage facility on the Baltic Sea in the future. Smaller tankers are to transport the LNG from there through the shallow Greifswalder Bodden to the actual terminal in Lubmin. The ship was assigned an anchorage in the Prorer Wiek by the authorities about seven kilometers northeast of the Sellin pier, Deutsche Regas said.
