On March 20, Jiangsu Yangzi Xinfu Shipbuilding Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Yangzijiang Shipbuilding Group, successfully shifted a 175,000 cbm large liquefied natural gas (LNG) carrier to the new berth.
It is the first Mark III Flex membrane LNG carrier built by a private shipbuilder in China.
Currently, the vessel has entered the outfitting stage and is expected to complete delivery in the second half of this year.
This type of LNG carrier has a length of 297 meters, a breadth of 46 meters and a deck area equivalent to three standard soccer fields. The vessel integrates the cutting-edge technology in the field of shipbuilding, which is safe, reliable, energy-saving and environment-friendly, with high degree of intelligence, and a number of indexes have reached the world’s leading level.
Large LNG carriers are internationally recognized as high-tech, high-difficulty, high-value-added vessels, enjoying the title of “crown jewel” in the shipbuilding industry. In recent years, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding aims at the LNG carrier market, making its foray into the LNG sector for the first time in 2022. The company announced the signing of two 175,000 cbm LNG carriers with a European shipowner on Oct. 26 of the same year, marking Yangzijiang Shipbuilding as the fourth shipbuilder in China, and the first private domestic shipbuilder, to receive an order for large LNG carriers. The new vessels will be delivered from 2025 to 2026.
As early as September 8, 2022, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding signed a patent cooperation agreement on the LNG MARK III membrane containment system with France’s GTT, marking that Yangzijiang Shipbuilding has officially obtained the qualification certification of France’s GTT, thus having the qualification to build large LNG carriers using the GTT MARK III membrane containment system. Thus, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding has become the first private shipbuilding enterprise in China to obtain this qualification, and laid the foundation for Yangzijiang Shipbuilding to strategically enter the large LNG carrier construction market.
In addition to LNG carriers, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding has become the second shipbuilder in China and the first private shipbuilder to secure orders for very large ammonia carriers (VLACs), as well as the first domestic shipbuilder to enter the market for very large ethane carriers (VLECs). Among these, four 88,000 cbm VLACs were ordered by the diversified Japanese shipowner Nissen Kaiun, with each vessel costing approximately $110 million, and three 100,000 cbm VLECs were ordered by Singapore-based shipping company SGP Chemicals.