“Maersk Ras Laffan” anchored outside the Isle of Koje in South Korea before the maiden voyage to Qatar.

“Maersk Ras Laffan”:
Newbuild with 25 years of charter

The Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) tanker Maersk Ras Laffan was the most expensive newbuild acquired by any Danish shipping company in 2004. Apart from being expensive it also called for a massive training programme for the dedicated crew and even some extras to be held in reserve. The training programme was launched as nobody in the A. P. Møller-Mærsk organisation had any experience with transport and handling of natural gas, and most of the crew that had any experience with steam turbine engines were also long gone.

The last steamships and turbine-powered tankers were sold in 1993. A. P. Møller-Mærsk had a brief touch with LNG ships in the beginning of 1970’s with the LNG Challenger, which was built by Moss Rosenberg for the joint venture of Fearnley & Eger, P&O and A. P. Møller. However, in 1970’s LNG consumption and transportation was in its early stages and not really profitable, and the tanker ended up in lay-up in Norway for most of its service life in the partnership. Most people also remember Kockum’s attempt to take the lead with LNG vessels: two newbuilds, LNG 559 and LNG 564, started in 1978, were completed in 1981-1984 and laid up until 1990, when they were sold to Shell International. Things has changed a lot and nowadays LNG is much more interesting not only as a household fuel, but also as industrial fuel in factories and production plants. In fact, the number of LNG carriers has increased from around 70 units worldwide a few years ago to 150 units at present, with a few more to come over the next years.

Even A. P. Møller-Mærsk has more in the pipeline. Another unit is dedicated to the same charters as the Maersk Ras Laffan and two more units are on order from Samsung Heavy Industries in South Korea. The three vessels in A. P. Møller-Mærsk’s order book are 148,000 cbm units.

Long charter
The Maersk Ras Laffan is a 138,200 cbm standard Samsung LNG carrier, which has been modified with, amongst other features, heavy redundancy systems overall on the ship. A. P. Møller-Mærsk has been looking at six sister vessels (half of them built for the English oil major BP) and has further enhanced safety and security for the ship and cargo. The tanker is flying the Danish flag and is owned by the joint venture K/S Membrane 1. The joint venture was set up by Qatar Shipping Corporation (25 per cent) and A. P. Møller-Mærsk (75 per cent). The tanker is fixed for 25 years to Ras Laffan Natural Gas Company (II), a joint venture between Qatar Petroleum (70 per cent) and Exxonmobil (30 per cent). Since April, the Maersk Ras Laffan has been sailing between Ras Laffan and Barcelona in Spain, but will later switch to trading on South Korea. The next LNG ship in the A. P. Møller-Mærsk fleet is fixed for 25 years to Ras Gas, which has fixed 12 new ships in total.

These vessels are being built for Maran Gas Maritime, TK Shipping, Kogas (Korea Gas), a Japanese consortium of MOL, NYK, K-Line and Mitsui as well as A. P. Møller-Mærsk.

Training
The intensive training programme has been applied to 28 officers – 12 in each crew and furthermore four senior officers in the reserve staff. They have all completed an 18-month training scheme including some 90 days at the Maersk Training Centre in Svendborg, Svendborg International Maritime Academy (SIMAC) and Marstal Navigationsskole.

On top of that the crew was signed on for one month on several LNG carriers owned by other shipping companies. The crew has also visited the shipyard which is building the vessel on Koje Island, just south of the Korean mainland.
A. P. Møller-Mærsk aspires to be a major player in LNG transportation, which means more than a two or four ship operation in LNG.

“We want to go much further,” says Jeppe Jensen, head of the LNG division at Maersk Tankers & Trampers.
“The potential in LNG is substantial in the coming years and we are planning to serve our clients, who are largely the same as our clients in oil tankers.”

Steam engine
The Maersk Ras Laffan is fitted with a Kawasaki Cross Compound turbine, which generates some 39,900 shaft horsepower and is powered by two boilers with a capacity of 65 ton/hour to a service speed of 20 knots. The interesting thing about the engine plant is that it can be fired with boiled-off gas from the cargo.

This means that the ship can run on fuel from the cargo tanks. In oil tankers such a system is theft and called a Greek valve, but on an LNG vessel it is part of the system and does not matter, as the time charter pays for the fuel anyway. There is a natural boil-off of around 200 cbm per day, which means that the Maersk Ras Laffan can sail on that alone and leave the fuel oil in the tanks. The boiler plant can use normal fuel, LNG or a combination.

The cargo pumps – also steam-powered – consist of eight deep-well pump units with a capacity of 1,750 cbm/hour. This means a total of 12 hours for loading or unloading the whole ship of 138,500 cbm.

Cargo tanks
The cargo section consists of four horizontal tanks built in a compound of steel, stainless steel, aluminium and glass-fibre reinforced plastic and covered with foam isolation. The construction is called a Membrane tank – here of the name of the company that owns the Maersk Ras Laffan. The compound of several materials has proven its worth over the years and is capable of keeping the gas at a level of 163°C below zero. At that temperature the LNG is a clear fluid, which runs like water.

Expensive ticket
The ticket to enter the LNG market is pricey as the ship is very expensive due to all the technology and safety and security. The price tag for the Maersk Ras Laffan read USD 165 million (DKK 1,237 billion) or nearly double that of the big container ships built by Odense Steel Shipyard. However, once on the market business is good with long-term charter agreements. There is not much of a spot market for LNG transports. Nearly 99 per cent of all cargoes are transported on long-term fixtures, which means that if you do not have a contract it is practically impossible to find cargo for the ship.

//Bent Mikkelsen