Gastech：LNG经北海/巴拿马航线直抵亚太 船东怎么看？（下）

The fleets’ repair & maintenance considerations

The Caribbean Side

• Currently, in the CAR/USEC area, the Bahamas has some R&M facilities suitable for LNG carriers
• More extensive R&M facilities in France and Iberia would require 3 weeks’ additional sailing time for ships dedicated to Panama routes
• How cost competitive would any new R&M facilities in the CAR/USEC area be and when might they be built?

The Pacific area

• LNG carriers trading in the Pacific have usually been drydocked in Singapore or Malaysia; there being few other facilities, or only at high cost in Japan and South Korea
• Adherence to the traditional dry-docking centres would entail a lengthy diversion for LNG carriers supplying cargoes to north-east Asia and returning to Panama
• KHI and MES recently announced a joint-venture company for ship repair – KHI MES Yura Dock – in Japan, principally to serve the new generation of LNG ships
• China may eventually offer a cost-competitive alternative to the South East Asian yards

The Northern Sea Route (NSR) fleet

The Arc 7s are to be dry-docked every 2.5 years as has traditionally been the case in LNG although most conventional ships now enter dock every 5 years

Northern Sea Route Logistical Challenges

Each of the 15 Yamal LNG Arc 7s are expected to perform about 14 voyages per annum

The NSR eastbound route to the Far East will be open only during the summer and early autumn, from about June to October

• During the winter and spring months, Yamal LNG has contracted with Fluxys to transship up to 8 million tonnes at Zeebrugge primarily for onward passage to the Asia-
• Pacific on conventional LNG carriers
• The fleet voyage schedule will include provision for repair & maintenance in Europe during the colder months
• Occasionally, other LNG carriers with a lower ice-class than the Arc 7s could be used to load cargoes directly from Sabetta to western destinations during the summer

The NSR presents myriad technical and operational challenges

The NSR offers a substantially shorter route to north-east Asian destinations – some 8,800nm – compared with transshipment through Belgium as made evident in this global depiction
 
However the NSR, and its westbound counterpart present various environmental difficulties and risks to operators as follows:

• Unpredictable weather and sea state risks – these are naturally more hazardous in Arctic regions. High winds pose the threat of icebergs colliding with the sides of the ships
  
• Ice forecasting – there is a lack currently of ground-based surveillance as a vital supplement to satellite imagery
  
• Ice risks – the NSR has been a beneficiary of global warming and ice retreat, but will this trend last until 2045, and for a possible 10 years’ Yamal extension period thereafter?

The Arctic also has more than a fair share of human-related challenges and risks

Crew-related issues – the environment poses significant psychological and physical demands on crews, requiring specialist training and prior preparation

Support services’ risks – Will ancillary services be suitable and adequate for LNGCs, and how quickly will pilots, tug masters and other personnel adapt to handling these ships?

Adequate support services along the NSR is a critical success factor

• Arc 7s can cope with ice of up to 2.1m thickness. To clear more extensive accumulations during the winter and spring – when LNG exports are directed through the western Arctic – icebreakers will be used
• Rosatomflot has 5 nuclear-powered icebreakers in operation and 3 more on order from Baltic Shipyard in St. Petersburg to fulfill a 22-year contract with Yamal LNG
• The LK-60 icebreakers – each delivering 60 MW power – have a displacement of up to 33,530 tonnes, are 173m long, 34m wide, and designed to break through 3m ice at up to 2 knots per hour
• Aside from marine services, shore facilities along the NSR are an important pre-requisite to successful operations, including observation posts for corroboration of satellite data, measurement of water depths for chart updating, and for ice forecasting
• Above all there is a pressing need for more experienced personnel, trained to liaise closely with ships’ crews

Panama Canal Logistical Challenges

The Panama Canal also presents various technical, operational and commercial risks

• Trans-Pacific navigation – The Great Circle route is not suitable for most LNG ships during winter months, requiring them to take a more southerly and lengthier passage during the other seasons
• Completion risks – the Canal expansion was originally due to be completed in 2014 and, following a series of delays and stoppages, is now expected ready during first quarter of 2016
• Locks’ operating risks – will the new locks in the Canal work?
• Hydrological risks – will any lack of fresh water in mid-Canal affect operations?
• Congestion, collision & security risks – naturally higher in any waterway
• Support services’ risks – Will ancillary services be suitable and adequate for the bigger vessels, and how quickly will Pilots, tug masters and other personnel adapt to handling LNG ships?
• Business risk – How important is LNG shippers’ custom going to be for the ACP compared with other users. Apparently, only 6 non-bookable transit slots are to be made available in each direction per day

The ACP has suggested a reservation system that would allow for the auctioning of scheduled transit slots, but this has not been finalised

Tolls’ escalation risks – there has been a significant overrun in expansion cost – at least a third more than the original $5.25bn figure when work began in 2007. What impact will cost overruns have during future toll reviews?

A 175,000m³ ship plying the USG-Japan via Panama route should be able to perform about 6.6 round voyages p.a.

• The graph shows the estimated days’ sailing on each route, and the number and quantity of cargo deliverable annually assuming 60 days’ off-hire per 5-year dry-docking cycle
• The design speeds of LNG ships are typically 19 or 19.5kt, but due to commercial factors or adverse meteorological & oceanographic conditions, particularly in the Pacific, Cape of Good Hope and Indian Ocean mean that sailing speeds would be lower depending upon the season and other factors
• The actual Canal transit is expected to be about one day, but additional time would be needed prior to entry, and for regular re-provisioning of the LNGC at either Colon or Balboa. In the Suez Canal, where vessels transit in convoys, the scheduled time used including waiting is typically 1.5 days
• 2.1~2.2 x 175,000m3 ships would be required on the Panama route to export 1 mmtpa to Japan
• Our 2025 base case of 27.5 million tonnes to Asia from the U.S. and Caribbean via Panama is equivalent to about 1 westbound transit per day – occupying around 65 ships – plus whatever is exported to the Americas Pacific coast
• The capacity to deliver 1 mmtpa to Japan via the Panama is 38% less than on the route around South Africa

Concluding Remarks

• Both the NSR and Panama Canal are set to be important conduits for new LNG supplies to the Asia-Pacific
• Both routes offer a faster and cheaper means of delivering LNG to the Far East as compared with via the Atlantic
• However, ship operators face myriad technical and operational challenges in ensuring safe and expeditious transit of the NSR and Panama Canal, and in the Pacific an Caribbean too
• Aside from the novel technologies developed to use the NSR, and expand the Panama Canal, human factors – both on shore and at sea – are critical to the success of operations on both routes
• Effective communication between the seafarers and marine ancillary services’ staff, such as the pilots, tug and icebreaker masters, will be of paramount importance
• The predominance of Japanese utilities, trading houses and ship owners engaged in US export projects offers the prospect of eventually cooperating to optimise overall fleet deployment between markets in the east and west