The first of the world's largest tankers for liquefied natural gas is due to be delivered on time by the end of the Northern summer, an executive at Gaztransport & Technigaz SA said. Fourteen more of the so-called Q-Max ships, which hold almost twice the amount of LNG as conventional tankers and will carry shipments from Qatar, are in construction, Frederic Deybach, engineering director at the Saint-Remy-les-Chevreuse, France-based designer of LNG containment systems, said today at a conference in Bangkok. Qatar, the world's biggest LNG producer, has ordered 45 LNG tankers from three South Korean shipyards capable of carrying more than 200,000 cubic meters each. The ships include 31 so-called Q-Flex ships, with a capacity about 1.5 times that of conventional tankers, and 14 Q-Max vessels. Eight Q-Flex vessels have come into service so far and the other 23 are in construction, Deybach said in an address at the Gastech conference. The Q-Flex ships have a capacity of as much as 216,000 cubic meters, while the Q-Max vessels have a capacity of as much as 266,000 cubic meters, said Andrew Richardson, shipping project manager at Qatargas Operating Co. The remaining 37 Q- Flex and Q-Max tankers are due to be delivered by mid-2010, he said. Each Q-Flex cargo is enough to power South Korean households for two days. __
