500 bottle version of the Knutsen PNG with a total capacity of 1,8 million standard cubic metres. The vessel is developed by Knutsen OAS Shipping in Haugesund, Western Norway.

CNG project snagged by election politics

A political move by the Norwegian centre/right government – which profess to be proponents of maritime innovation – and the main opposition party, the Labour party, appears to have got in the way of the interesting project for seaborne transport of PNG (pressurized natural gas) to supply Norway and later Sweden. The partners in the project are Knutsen OAS, Norske Shell and Haugaland Gass.

A majority of Norwegian MPs are lending financial support to a project to pipe natural gas from Kårstøe in Western Norway and the Grenland region in Telemark and to Mid-Norway around Trondheim.

The timescale of this project is a little vague, to say the least, and it has put spanners in the works of Knutsen OAS. Scandinavian Shipping Gazette wrote in January last year that the Knutsen PNG is deceptively simple with a great deal of flexibility. Therefore, the project is likely to go ahead. Per Lothe, project director at Knutsen OAS, is a little despondent and surprised that the Norwegian government will provide funding for a pipeline to compete with Knutsen’s own project.

So far, the neither the government nor the Grenland region has produced firm cost figures for the pipeline project or any reliable timescale. 2005 is an election year in Norway, and the Labour party has pushed hard to forward the idea of piping gas to the two regions to promote job creation.
Why the government has gone along with the idea is a bit unclear except that it is general acceptance that more use of natural gas to fuel Norwegian industry is a long-term goal.

Likely to go ahead
While government agencies are pondering how to finance such a huge project, the Knutsen/Shell/Haugaland Gass project is likely to go ahead. Their concept offers more flexibility than a pipeline alternative. It is deceptively simple. Using containment system onboard based on pressurized natural gas the system offers a flexible and very competitive alternative for transportation of natural gas. Knutsen OAS could use several versions of the Knutsen PNG carrier.

The 500-bottle version illustrated below has a gas capacity of 1.8 million standard cubic metres, but there are designs for vessel up to 33 million standard cubic metres. Compressed natural gas is pressurized up to 3,600 psig. In order to make PNG you need LNG with at least 90 per cent of methane. This process is not very capital intensive and it purifies the gas. Tanks are of stainless steel and insulated in order to transport LNG at minus 163 degrees Celsius. Main propulsion machinery is diesel electric and using gas engines, fuelled by recovered, evaporated gas from the cargo. The diesel engines are only used when the vessel is in ballast.

Flexible technology
No PNG carrier has so far been built, but Knutsen already has a very small LNG carrier, the Pioneer Knutsen, delivered a little over one year ago. This vessel is packed with the latest technology described above, and is the forerunner of vessels to be built with flexibility in mind.

As usual the new technology has created a great deal more interest abroad than in Norway. Not only is the PNG carrier tailor-made for distribution of LNG, but the technology can be applied to unprocessed gas directly from offshore fields anywhere in the world. For gas field, which are not big enough to warrant a costly pipeline, it could mean the difference between production and non-viability. There are a number of such fields in the North Sea and elsewhere in the major offshore areas, and this technology could add value by recovering the resources.

The distribution project
We noted above that the Knutsen/Shell/Haugaland Gass project is simple in its concept. Haugaland Gass is to set up a compression and shipping terminal, which will be fed by natural gas diverted via a branch pipeline from the existing Statpipe pipeline network at the Kaarstø land terminal. The compressed gas is shipped by Knutsen OAS tankers for distribution along the Norwegian coast and later to Sweden. Norske Shell will organise the local distribution.

One suspect that the politicians have, “inadvertently”, delayed the Knutsen project. It comes as no surprise that very few national politicians have any detailed knowledge of the project and its potential. Maritime innovation is nominally high on the governments agenda, but it appears support depends on where the innovative ideas are coming from. The government prefers innovation to be state managed through the new body Marut or to emanate from government supported research bodies. It certainly narrows the scope for innovation and lengthens the odds.

//Petter Arentz

Latest update 18-10-2006 8:49

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