Another Spanish port is upgraded to offer LNG bunkering services
Ayesa is set to redesign the mooring jetty for the Enagás regasification plant in the Port of Huelva. This will allow small-scale vessels to be refueled and vessels to be loaded with LNG for subsequent ship-to-ship bunkering. The mooring jetty in Huelva will be the third designed by Ayesa, following similar ones in Barcelona and Cartagena. Stefan Pardo, Head of Oil & Gas at Ayesa, said that the company will be responsible for drafting the detailed engineering project, as well as the specifications for materials and equipment Methane carriers transporting LNG will unload fuel at the port at a very low temperature (-161 ºC). Enagás will then store it in a liquid state in total containment cryogenic tanks with outer concrete walls, before it is distributed in tanker trucks or regasified to be transported via pipelines. In order to adapt the plant for these kinds of services, new pipe connections must be created on the mooring jetties, as well as monitoring and measuring systems to allow LNG to be loaded onto small-scale methane tankers through flexible hoses suitable for very low temperatures. These tankers will then refuel large vessels moored in the port or transport the LNG to other small-scale vessels. The adaptation of the regasification plant in Huelva for is part of the CORE LNGas hive project, which aims to promote LNG as a fuel, mainly for marine use, in the Iberian Peninsula. This initiative, co-financed by the European Commission, is coordinated by Enagás and led by the Spanish state company, Puertos del Estado, which manages Spain’s state-owned ports. The use of LNG as a fuel also contributes to improving air quality. LNG is an environmentally-friendly fuel as it does not release SOx or particle matter into the atmosphere, as well as significantly reducing CO2 and NOx emissions, thus allowing ever more stringent environmental regulations and targets for emission reduction to be met. In this sense, the Iberian Peninsula currently offers one of the fastest growing markets in terms of the adoption of this fuel. In this extremely encouraging scenario, AltFuels Iberia 2019 will take place on 11-14 June at IFEMA Trade Center, Madrid. It will be an event consisting of first level conferences and exhibition of vehicles of all kinds, refueling stations, components, plants, road and marine engines, as well as the entire universe of the alternative fuels industry with the latest technological developments, multiple options for networking, business and new advances. For more information, please contact info@altfuelsiberia.com.
