Lubmin FSRU

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Lubmin FSRU, also known as German Baltic Sea LNG Terminal and Deutsche Ostsee LNG Import Terminal, is a retired liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminal in Germany. The project was an interim LNG terminal that operated from January 2023 until its floating storage regasification unit (FSRU), the Neptune FSRU, departed in May 2024 to begin serving the Mukran FSRU project. There are now plans to develop a hydrogen import terminal at the site.

Location

The terminal is located in the port of Lubmin, Germany.

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Project details

LNG Import Terminal

• Operator: Deutsche Regas

• Owner: Deutsche Regas

• Parent company: Deutsche Regas

• Vessel: Neptune

• Vessel operator: Höegh LNG

• Vessel owner: Höegh LNG (50%), TotalEnergies (50%)

• Vessel parent company: Morgan Stanley (50%), TotalEnergies (50%)

• Location: Port of Lubmin, Germany

• Coordinates: 54.153332, 13.645319 (approximate)

• Capacity: 3.8 mtpa or 5.2 bcm/y (nominal capacity), 5.7 mtpa or 7.8 bcm/y (peak capacity)
  • Formerly 4.5 billion cubic meters per year (bcm/y) or 3.31 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) by December 2022

• Status: Retired

• Type: Import

• Start year: 2023
  • Formerly 2022

• Cost: €100 million (US$96.5 million) estimated (funds already available for project, may not represent total cost)

• Financing:

• FID status:

• Associated infrastructure: Mukran FSRU, European Gas Pipeline Link (EUGAL), NEL Gas Pipeline

Hydrogen Import Terminal

• Operator:

• Owner: Deutsche Regas

• Parent company: Deutsche Regas

• Vessel:

• Vessel operator: Höegh LNG

• Vessel owner:

• Vessel parent company:

• Location: Port of Lubmin, Germany

• Coordinates: 54.153332, 13.645319 (approximate)

• Capacity:

• Status: Proposed

• Type: Import

• Start year: 2026

• Cost:

• Financing:

• FID status:

• Associated infrastructure:

Background

Deutsche Regas, founded in April 2022 to develop the terminal, is working with TotalEnergies to develop a floating LNG terminal at the German port of Lubmin. TotalEnergies is expected to provide the floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU).

Part of a wave of new German floating LNG terminals announced in spring 2022 as part of emergency national plans to diversify away from Russian gas imports, the terminal is the first and so far only privately financed FSRU. Due to the shallow depth of the Greifswalder Bodden in front of Lubmin, a tanker (Floating Storage Unit - FSU) will be stationed outside the Greifswalder Bodden in the Baltic Sea, to which LNG tankers will dock and transfer their LNG. From there, three shuttle ships will transport the LNG to the FSRU for regasification in the Lubmin industrial port. Then the gas will be fed from the FSRU into Germany's long-distance gas pipeline network which is 450 meters away.

In September 2022, construction at the project site began, with Deutsche Regas aiming to commence operations by December 1, 2022. There are also plans to expand the terminal to have a total of 15 bcm/y capacity once two additional FSRUs are in place. Hydrogen importing is also foreseen at the terminal in the future. It was also announced that the Australian infrastructure investor Macquarie Capital had taken a minority stake in Deutsche Regas, and that its subsidiary Wavecrest Energy, which specialises in LNG projects, is to provide technical and operational support for the project. The Deutsche Regas website states that "Around 100 million euros are already available for the project."

According to the Deutsche Regas website, as of November 2022, Phase 1 of the project from December 1, 2022 will see capacity of at least 4.5 bcm coming online. Phase 2, starting in December 2023, plans to see the installation of another FSRU with capacity of 7 bcm. Further, by relocating the first FSRU from the port of Lubmin to an offshore location in 2024, its capacity will be increased by a further 2 bcm (Phase 1.5). These subsequent phases refer to the Mukran FSRU project. Overall, from the fourth quarter of 2024, the project's planned capacity will total 13.5 bcm.

In November 2022, TotalEnergies' Neptune FSRU arrived at the terminal site.

In December 2022, the floating storage unit (FSU) Seapeak Hispania arrived at the site. According to LNG Prime, "In the future, this vessel will take liquefied natural gas from LNG carriers and store it while smaller carriers will take take the fuel from the FSU and deliver it to the FSRU in Lubmin due to draft restrictions in the area."

On 14 January 2023, an inauguration ceremony was held for the Neptune FSRU Phase 1.

In May 2023, Deutsche ReGas said that it would move the FSRU Neptune to its Mukran FSRU facility later that year, with economic and ecological advantages in the new site. Local residents in Lubmin have complained about the noise generated by the FSRU.

In September 2023, Deutsche ReGas announced that it had begun a front-end engineering and design (FEED) study for a large-scale electrolysis plant that will produce green hydrogen. The project is expected to launch in 2026.

In May 2024, the Neptune FSRU left Lubmin to being service at Mukran FSRU, and current plans are to develop a hydrogen import terminal at the Lubmin site. As such, the project is now considered to be retired.

Hydrogen Import Terminal

In July 2024, Deutsche ReGas and Hoegh LNG signed a deal to develop a floating hydrogen import terminal at the project site, with a start date of 2026. According to Deutsche ReGas, "The terminal will be the world’s first floating green ammonia cracker, producing around 30,000 tons of hydrogen per year that will be fed into the hydrogen core network via the existing feed-in point at the Deutsche ReGas terminal in the port of Lubmin."

Opposition

In August 2023, the German environmental group Deutsche Umwelthilfe (DUH) said that it had filed a lawsuit against Deutsche Regas arguing that it causes noise pollution and is too small to be exempted from environmental permits. "Neither the shuttle traffic (used to access the Neptune), nor the resulting environmental impact on the sensitive Greifswalder Bodden have been subject to environmental permits," DUH said in a statement.