Polish Baltic Sea Coast FSRU

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Polish Baltic Sea Coast Terminal is a proposed floating storage regasification unit (FSRU) LNG terminal in Poland. A second, proposed FSRU expansion project has been shelved.

Location

The terminal is to be located about 3 km offshore of Poland's Baltic Coast in Gdansk.

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Project details

• Operator: Gaz-System
• Owner: Gaz-System
• Parent company: PKN Orlen
• Vessel:
• Vessel Operator: Mitsui O.S.K Lines
• Vessel Owner:
• Vessel Parent company:
• Location: Gdansk, Poland
• Coordinates: 54.424696, 18.735850 (approximate)
• Capacity: 6.1 bcm/y
• Status: Proposed
• Type: Import
• Cost: €620 million (US$655 million)
• Financing: €19.6 million (US$20.7 million) grant from the EU's Connecting Europe Facility
• FID status: FID (2023)
• Start year: 2028
  • Formerly 2027/2028
  • Formerly 2025

Expansion Project (Second FSRU)

• Operator: Gaz-System
• Owner: Gaz-System
• Parent company: PKN Orlen
• Location: Gdansk, Poland
• Coordinates: 54.424696, 18.735850 (approximate)
• Capacity: 4.5 bcm/y
• Status: Shelved
• Type: Import
• Cost:
• Financing:
• FID status: Pre-FID
• Start year:

Note: mtpa = million tonnes per year; bcfd = billion cubic feet per day; bcm/y = billion cubic meters per year

Background

The Polish Baltic Sea Coast Terminal in Gdansk is an FSRU project that failed to receive Project of Common Interest (PCI) status in the 2017 list. It appears to have been proposed in March 2017. Early estimates of the terminal's capacity ranged up to 8.1 billion cubic meters of LNG per year, a figure that represented up to 50% of Poland’s 2015 demand for natural gas. According to Food and Water Europe's 2019 profile on Polish gas use and production, "Considering the low utilization rate of the already existing terminal [under 40%] and the current predictions that don’t foresee any significant decrease in LNG price, the possibility of it being viable economically is very low.

The terminal received PCI status in 2019 when the EU's fourth PCI list was released.

The FSRU terminal was included in the 5th PCI list published by the European Commission in November 2021.

In December 2021, project promoter Gaz-System announced that it had launched a binding open season (up to December 27, 2021) to verify market interest in the proposed project. In March 2021, Poland's biggest gas company PGNiG announced it had placed an order for an unspecified volume of regasification capacity under the first phase of Gaz-System's open season, the overall outcome of which remained unclear.

In May 2022, PGNiG signed a Heads of Agreement with US firm Sempra Energy for 3 mtpa of LNG (approximately 4 bcm/y after regasification) of LNG for 20 years starting from 2027 once a sale and purchase agreement is in place. The LNG is to be received at the Baltic Sea Coast FSRU, and would come from two of Sempra's proposed export terminals in the Gulf of Mexico: the future expansion of the Cameron LNG Terminal (2 mtpa) and the Port Arthur LNG Terminal (1 mtpa).

In June 2022, Poland's energy and climate minister Anna Moskwa announced plans to double the size of the Gdansk terminal to accommodate new natural gas demand from Ukraine, Slovakia and the Czech Republic in response to the Russia-Ukraine war. The expanded terminal project would include two vessels with a combined capacity of 12 billion cubic meters per year.

In December 2022, the European Commission's Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) granted funding to the project for the development of technical specifications and performance of engineering works.

In February 2023, LNG Prime reported that Gaz-System was moving forward with developing the first 6.1 bcm/y FRSU in the project.

In March 2023, according to the 2023 GIIGNL report, "GAZ-SYSTEM launched a non-binding open season for regasification capacity, which will deliver approximately 4.5 BCMA of natural gas. The decision on the final regasification capacity of the new terminal will depend on the results of the market screening."

In November 2023, Gaz-System announced that bids for the second FSRU expansion project did not meet the threshold to proceed, but that discussions on the project may be continued in the future. The expansion project is now considered shelved.

According to the annual GIIGNL report, released in June 2024, for the base FSRU project the sponsor has booked its full regasification capacity; signed an agreement with Orlen to provide regasification services; signed agreements with the Maritime Office in Gdynia and the Port of Gdánsk authority on cooperation in implementing the project; selected Mitsui O.S.K. Lines for the provision and operation of the FSRU; and obtained an environmental permit for the terminal.