Petronas is looking to build up its own fleet of LNG ships rather than relying on subsidiary MISC, the energy major said in a statement Thursday.
The move comes as Petronas failed earlier this year to privatize MISC, falling some 4$ short of the 90% of shares needed for a takeover.
"This is part of our strategy to optimise the value of liquefied natural gas business," Petronas said yesterday.
Petronas will engage MISC to provide project management and technical consultancy services for the construction of the new LNG ships.
MISC has recently called tenders for four plus four options of LNG newbuilds, which are expected to start deliveries by the end of 2015, coinciding with the commencement of Petronas’s new LNG projects such as Gladstone, MLNG 4, Kanowit FPSO and Rotan LNG.
"We also expect Petronas to require at least another five LNG ships to support its LNG shipments from 50% stake in Northwest Pacific, Canada (assuming export permit granted by Canada government), which will increase MISC capacity by another 16% to 5.35m cu m," HLIB Research said in a report out this week.
MISC currently has a fleet of 27 LNG ships.