Bangladesh plans to launch three to four floating storage and regasification units (FSRUs) to ease its gas shortage, Finance Minister Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury has said.
Investors from China, the United States and South Korea are interested, he said on Monday at a discussion organised by the Foreign Investors’ Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Dhaka.
“Offshore and onshore gas exploration is being accelerated. Alongside exploration under contracts, we have decided to strengthen Bapex and drill 150 wells, and approval has been given to purchase the necessary equipment,” he said.
“To address the gas shortage, we plan to launch three to four new FSRUs, involving private investors from Korea, China and America.”
A new site with a 20-metre draft has also been identified near Khulna, alongside Matarbari, for a terminal where large vessels could unload oil and LNG directly.
The announcement follows the return on Oct 14 of a proposal by China National Energy Engineering and Construction Company (CNEE) to build an offshore LNG terminal at Kutubjom, Maheshkhali.
Khosru presided over the purchase committee meeting.
The proposed deal would have cost Tk 12.32 billion over 15 years or Tk 13.16 billion over 20 years.
CNEE proposed daily regasification capacity of 600 million cubic feet, with a maximum of 750 million.
Its proposed daily fee of $342,000 was 35 to 37 percent above current costs for terminals operated by Excelerate Energy ($254,000) and Summit LNG ($249,115).
Bangladesh needs about 3.8 billion cubic feet of gas daily, while domestic production and imported LNG usually supply around 2.7 billion.
The two existing Moheshkhali terminals have combined capacity of about 1.1 billion cubic feet a day. The United States urges transparent, competitive bidding for terminal projects.