As the US has approved the second shale gas export, shipbuilding industry is suggested that orders for liquefied natural gas (LNG) carrier for shipping shale gas is expected to rise.  
Jeon Jae-Chun, analyst at Daishin Securities of Korea said “Shale gas will be officially exported from 2017 and order for LNG carrier will commence from the next year.”
Freeport LNG project was awarded an approval for shale gas export to non-FTA countries from the US Department of Energy on May 17. Accordingly, 4.4m tons of gas will be exported to Japan’s Osaka Gas and Chubu Electric Power starting from 2017 with other 4.4m to BP from 2018.
Analyst Jeon revealed that, “The LNG carriers for the first gas delivery will be around six to nine vessels which are subject to be ordered at a Japanese yard,” and added, “Although Korean yards are not able to win orders now, they are anticipated to stand to benefit from following LNG export approvals.”
Analyst Park Moo-Hyun, E*Trade Securities of Korea mentioned that long-term prospective is needed when seeing the increase of shale gas export regarding its economic feasibility, saying “Orders for LNG carrier will increase greatly this year and the next year, independent of whether the US shale gas will be expanded or not.”
He explained, “The low economic feasibility of the US shale gas is good news to LNG development projects in Australia and Africa because orders for LNGC must be preceded before offshore LNG development,” and continued, “Moreover, Spot market is expanding in LNG market that tonnage seems necessarily to increase. Also, shipping distance is getting longer that LNGC’s fuel efficiency gets growing interests.”
Thus, Park said, “Orders for LNGC are expected to be placed for more than 40 vessels annually for this year and the next year. Korean shipbuilding industry will be the greatest beneficiary of all.”