Italian oil company Eni has marked the beginning of construction of the hull for Coral South floating LNG (FLNG) unit for a project located offshore Mozambique.
At the presence of Mozambique’s Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy, Ernesto Max Tonela , Eni and its Area 4 partners held on Thursday at Geoje Island, South Korea, the “First Steel Cut” ceremony that marks the beginning of the construction of the hull of Coral South’s FLNG vessel.
The ceremony took place just 15 months after Coral South Project’s Final Investment Decision (FID), highlighting the commitment of Area 4 Partners to start LNG production by 2022.
To remind, Eni sanctioned its Coral South project in June 2017 and achieved financial close for a total amount of around $4.7 billion for the Coral South FLNG multi-sourced project financing in December 2017.
Announcing the beginning of construction on Thursday, Eni said that the hull is designed to accommodate the storage facilities for all the substances that will be processed and produced in the floating liquefaction plant, mainly Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) and condensates. In addition to the storage tanks, some of the electrical, instrumentation and mechanical rooms, as well as all maritime systems related to cargo management, will be located in the hull.
The FLNG construction started with the steel cut for the ship’s turret, which took place in March this year in Singapore.
The other main component of the FLNG, the topside modules, will also be built in South Korea at the Samsung Heavy Industries shipyards and the construction is planned to start end of this year. Eni said that the FLNG is expected to be completed by the end of 2021 and first gas is expected in 2022.
Eni is the delegated operator for the Coral South FLNG project, the first project to monetize the world class gas resources discovered in Area 4, Mozambique. The Area 4 participants are Eni (25%), ExxonMobil (25%), CNPC (20%), Empresa Nacional de Hidrocarbonetos E.P. (10%), Kogas (10%) and Galp Energia (10%).
Eni begins construction of the Hull for #CoralSouth Floating LNG Unit. The ceremony takes place just 15 months after Project’s FID, highlighting the commitment of Area 4 Partners to start #LNG production by 2022 https://t.co/BdyiufFpvE #Mozambique pic.twitter.com/zEfJjdXNvU
— eni.com (@eni) September 6, 2018