Bahrain’s National Oil and Gas Authority (NOGA) and its investment unit Nogaholding have signed deals with Bermuda-registered Teekay LNG, Korea’s Samsung C&T and Kuwait-based Gulf Investment Corp (GIC), for development of an LNG import terminal in Bahrain. Nogaholding says the project involves a floating storage unit (FSU), an offshore receiving jetty and breakwater, an adjacent regasification platform, subsea gas pipelines from platform to shore, and an onshore gas receiving facility. The terminal will have capacity to import 400mn cfd of gas, expandable to 800mn cfd. It will be owned and operated for 20 years from July 2018 by the Bahrain LNG JV: Nogaholding 30%, Teekay 30%, Samsung 20% and GIC 20%.

Bahrain LNG has awarded Korea’s GS Engineering & Construction a $655mn engineering, procurement and construction contract to build the terminal. It will fund construction through a combination of equity capital and project finance involving regional and international banks. The EPC contract cost does not include the FSU, which will be time-chartered from Teekay LNG. Like other Gulf oil and gas producers, Bahrain is approaching the point where its gas capacity is uncomfortably close to its supply limits (MEES, 23 May 2014). Bahrain produced around 1.63bn cfd of gas in 2014, according to the BP Statistical Review. About one-third is burned in power plants. (CONTINUED - 384 WORDS)