The construction of the Caribbean FLNG barge is about 95 percent completed, project partner Exmar of Belgium said on Wednesday.
The commissioning of the unit will start in the course of this summer in China. Necessary permits and authorization to conduct the commissioning are currently on-going, according to Exmar.
Pacific Rubiales will start chartering the barge as from successful commissioning of the Caribbean FLNG as per the underlying 15 years contract.
Exmar and Pacific Rubiales are actively looking at various gas fields around the world to commercially employ the barge since the original project off the Caribbean coast of Colombia has been postponed.
The Caribbean FLNG project, which is expected to be the world’s first operational FLNG facility, is being delivered by Wison Offshore & Marine at its yard in Nantong under a contract with Exmar.
The project comprises a non-propelled barge equipped to convert 72.0 million scf/d of natural gas into LNG (about 500,000 tons of LNG per annum) for temporary storage and export.