Floating Liquefied Natural Gas (FLNG) Market Forecast 2014-2024

Traditionally, LNG facilities have been built onshore, but this has become increasingly expensive in recent years, leading to the development of more cost effective solutions such as FLNG.

The global market for floating liquefied natural gas (FLNG) can be divided into two distinct areas: LNG FPSOs (Liquefied Natural Gas Floating Production Storage and Offloading Vessels) and FSRUs (Floating Storage and Regasification Units). This report addresses both of these markets, quantifying the opportunity for growth expected over the next ten years.

Floating regasification vessels, in operation since 2005, allow for flexible transportation of LNG. Three companies: Excelerate Energy, Golar LNG and Höegh LNG have taken the majority of ownership of floating regasification vessels thus far, although several other companies have begun to enter the market. There are currently 15 units operational in Asia, Europe, the Middle East, North America, South America, and Southeast Asia. Floating regasification vessels will be particularly useful in areas where there are, at present, major gas shortfalls (e.g. Egypt, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh). The introduction of further floating regasification vessels will continue throughout the world, however, since they are more economic and timely than land-based terminals.

Floating liquefaction has been proposed as an economical solution to monetising stranded and associated gas. As of 2014, there are no floating liquefaction plants in operation, though the Exmar and Pacific Rubiales vessel will commence operation off the northern coast of Columbia in mid 2015. Petronas’ first vessel is also due to become commercially operational in late 2015 off the coast of Malaysia. However, the project garnering the most attention in the FLNG market is Shell’s Prelude, due to come online by 2017 off the west coast of Australia. These three vessels represent the wide range of capacity floating liquefaction vessels can have: the Shell vessel is of the large variety, producing over 3 million tonnes of LNG produced per annum (mmtpa). The Petronas vessel is of the medium-sized variety, and will produce 1-2 mmtpa, whereas the Exmar/Pacific Rubiales vessel will produce just 0.5 mmpta. In addition to these three vessels, there are a number of conceptual designs at different stages of project development due to come online throughout the forecast period. Visiongain anticipates a handful of final investment decisions (FID) will be taken over the next three years. The technical intricacies of constructing FLNG production facilities will ensure a build time of between three and five years depending on the design.

Visiongain values the global FLNG market at $11.845bn in 2014. The FLNG market is forecast by visiongain to experience strong expansion over the next five years, reaching peak levels of CAPEX in 2018. In the second half of the 10-year forecast, visiongain forecasts that spending will decline slightly, but remain at similarly strong levels as the LNG value chain as a whole continues to grow.
Source: ReportBuyer