GAS Entec Co., Ltd. announced the plan to build a LNG fuelled reefer carrier. On April 14th, GAS Entec announced via corporate website that they signed MOA (Memorandum of Agreement) with SEoIL Agency Co., Ltd., a professional shipper of refrigeration cargo, and they agreed to construct, invest, charter and operate a 155,000ft3 reefer carrier. And also they agreed to ship the new vessel to the existing operating route of SEoIL Agency from 4Q 2018.

GAS Entec To Build New LNG Fuelled Reefer Carrier

According to the agreement, GAS Entec will lead the investment and financing for the construction of the LNG-fuelled reefer carrier and will lead the entire newbuilding project, including selection of shipyards and supply of engineering design service and major equipment.

SEoIL Agency is responsible for long-term charter contracts and operations as a shipping company, and it has been known that it has established mutual cooperation relationship to provide technical and commercial information on the founding and operation of reefer carrier to GAS Entec.

GAS Entec declared on the homepage, "This vessel, which will be recorded as the world's first LNG fuelled reefer carrier, will become GAS Entec’s state-of-the-art of LNG technology".

The key factor that GAS Entec selected as a reefer carrier is an indirect type of cargo hold cooling system, which is named EnergiCoolTM by LNG cold energy utilization which came from the cryogenic energy generated during the vaporization process of LNG, propulsion and power generation fuel.

As a result, this technology eliminates the need for existing cooling equipment such as large compressors and there is drastic reduction of power consumption and the fuel consumption of the generator, as well as greatly reduce the maintenance cost of cooling equipment.

To this end, GAS Entec will jointly develop LNG refrigerant system with Dongwha Entec and agreed to apply the cycle and generator as a dual fuel engine in cooperation with Wartsila who are the pioneer on the duel fuel engine industry. In addition, by applying membrane LNG cargo hold technology, and existing cargo hold insulation system will be replaced by products developed by Hankuk Carbon. 

GAS Entec said, "When we apply cargo hold insulation developed by Hankuk Carbon, the thickness of the existing cargo hold wall, which is near 1 meter, will be reduced to one-third, which will greatly increase cargo load and contribute to reduction of construction cost".

"If this new refrigerated cargo carrier is proven to have a 30% operating cost savings compared to the existing one, it will be big impact to hundreds of homogenous newbuilding markets around the world."

Image: Gas Entec