Nakilat to order further 9 to 11 LNG carriers

Faisal Mohammed Al Suwaidi, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Qatargas Operating Company, yesterday said that Qatargas Transport Company (Nakilat) is expected to order a further 9 to 11 LNG vessels for RasGas-3 and Qatargas-4 this year.

He said that at the beginning, Nakilat activities were primarily focused on securing partial ownership of between 30 and 60% of the original 29 LNG vessels ordered. This was equal to approximately 54% ownership of the first tranche of ships.

“However, in order to maximise returns to our shareholders, a new strategy was adopted whereby Nakilat would own 100% of all subsequent LNG vessels ordered for the Qatargas and RasGas projects. As a result, 16 ships were ordered for Qatargas II and Qatargas III”, he said.

This change in strategy required Nakilat to fund the additional construction costs of these 100% owned ships in order to meet the Qatargas and RasGas ship delivery schedules. He reiterated that in order to meet its payment obligations to the Korean shipbuilding yards Nakilat is obligated to cash call the remaining equity contribution from its shareholders this year.

This obligation is in accordance with the information provided to the shareholders at the time of the initial public offer (IPO), he said, adding that a reference in the Annual Report for 2005 clearly states that the remaining 50% would be requested in 2007.

“We promised that we would acquire 30 to 60% equity in those ships. Now most of the ships will be on 100% equity and 28 of 60 ships will be on 100%.”