29-03-05 Qatar is planning to order about 70 LNG carriers from South Korean shipbuilders by 2010, a deal that is likely worth around $ 15 bn, Qatar's Minister of Energy and Industry, Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah, said.
"We plan to order 70 new ships -- big ones that never have been built before -- with a size of 200,000 cm plus. The total cost will be more than $ 15 bn within a five- to six-year term, and all the ships will come from Korea. It's a big contract," the minister told.

Earlier, three South Korean shipbuilders -- Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering, Samsung Heavy Industries and Hyundai Heavy Industries -- said they were selected as preferred bidders by QatarGas Operating Co. to build up to 44 LNG carriers by 2010.
Qatar plans to procure the 44 LNG carriers for the QatarGas II project -- in which state-run Qatar Petroleum has a 70 % stake and US energy giant ExxonMobil has 30 %.

The QatarGas II project is scheduled to provide LNG to the UK by the winter of 2007 or 2008. The QatarGas II project is an LNG development project that will involve construction of pipelines and two 7.8-mm-tpy LNG trains with a total value of $ 12 bn, according to Qatar Petroleum.
Daewoo Shipbuilding and Samsung Heavy each said they are expecting to receive a minimum order of 15 LNG carriers from the project, with a maximum order of 40 carriers between the two companies.

Under the first phase of the project, QatarGas II plans to place an order for 12 LNG tankers by the end of this year, al-Attiyah said. Qatar decided to place additional orders for about 26 vessels for other projects apart from the QatarGas II project.
"By 2010, Qatar will operate a fleet of 90 energy ships, up from the current 20 vessels," al-Attiyah said.

The three South Korean shipbuilders said they each have the capacity to build 9-10 LNG carriers a year, and Samsung and Daewoo plan to increase their capacities to 14 LNG vessels by 2008.
Details of contract, including prices, sizes and the exact number of vessels, however, will be decided later, the companies said.