A gas carrier with sanctioned Russian LNG went away from European eyes

The gas carrier, which is suspected of having taken the first cargo of the sanctioned Arctic LNG—2, is passing by the shores of Europe. Even analysts are trying to calculate his whereabouts. Judging by the AIS data, the tanker headed away from European eyes. The ship was skirting Northwestern Europe around Great Britain.

Pioneer LNG tanker, which can carry the first cargo from Arctic LNG — 2, which has come under direct US sanctions, is skirting Europe. At the same time, the gas carrier did not take the standard route through the English Channel, but to the north. According to AIS vessels, the tanker bypassed Northwestern Europe from the north of the UK.

Obviously, the tanker decided not to go in a powerful shipping stream and stay away from unnecessary eyes. The vessel is already in the Atlantic Ocean and has turned off the transponder again, which transmits the location and course of the vessel.

Thus Pioneer was already misleading. However, in early August, the tanker was spotted on satellite images on loading at the Arctic LNG—2 project on the Gydan Peninsula. On August 10, another gas carrier, Asya Energy, was found on satellite images at Arctic LNG—2.

The second tanker could also take up to 100 million cubic meters of gas in the form of LNG. And shipments may indicate that Novatek has found ways to circumvent direct US sanctions imposed on the project in November last year.

Now in the West they are trying to find out where the two sanctioned cargoes will arrive, as the recipient may fall under US sanctions, where they announced plans to crack down on Arctic LNG—2. It is obvious that gas carriers are heading to Asia, where the demand for LNG is high and there are more opportunities to hide cargo. Whether it will be reloaded to other tankers on the high seas to further confuse the trackers is unknown.

"At the current production level (at Arctic LNG — 2), we can expect tankers to be loaded every 8 days or so," Mehdi Tuil, a leading LNG specialist at Calypso Commodities, told gCaptain.

As EADaily reported, both gas carriers are operated by Indian Ocean Speedstar Solutions. Transportation of sanctioned Russian LNG went the way of transporting Russian oil after the introduction of restrictions in December 2022. In 2022, the unknown Indian Gatik Ship Management, also registered in Mumbai, made a splash in the tanker market. In less than a year, the company became the owner of fifty vessels worth $ 1.4 billion and transported mainly Russian oil to India.

During 2023, most of the Gatik Ship Management tankers lost registration and insurance in Western countries, but after changing the flag, the gas carriers passed to small unknown operators. But they continued to carry Russian oil to India.

Obviously, such schemes are being prepared for the transportation of Russian LNG.

However, as experts noted to EADaily back in May, the transportation of liquefied gas is more complicated.

"The risks of creating a shadow fleet of gas carriers are noticeably higher compared, for example, with a similar oil fleet. This is due to the fact that there are many times fewer gas carriers than oil tankers. All of them are traditionally monitored, and disabling transponders raises additional questions," said energy expert Alexander Sobko. — In addition, LNG is a much more complex product in transshipment and storage compared to oil. It is also important to make sure that there are a sufficient number of LNG buyers from such tankers, since storage on water and a series of transshipment, as sometimes happens with oil, leads to additional losses."

The Financial Times reported, citing consulting company Windward, that since the second quarter of 2023, more than 50 LNG vessels have changed owners to companies located in the UAE, and tankers can be involved in the transportation of Russian gas. However, so far the databases speak only about nine tankers.

Arctic LNG—2 will become the second Russian Arctic gas liquefaction project with a capacity of 19.8 million tons per year. In November, he was directly sanctioned by the United States. In Washington, they said they wanted to kill the project. As a result, Novatek and the recipients of LNG from Arctic LNG — 2 declared force majeure. The first line of the project was launched in December last year, but shipments were postponed. Obviously, this was due to the lack of arc7 ice-class tankers. Out of the navigation season, LNG export is impossible without them. The construction of ice-class tankers was ordered in South Korea and at the Zvezda shipyard. In the first case, some of the vessels have been built, but due to sanctions they cannot be transferred. At the Russian shipyard, work is delayed due to sanctions.