Arrival Of First Algerian Gas Tankers To Southern Spain

The first Algerian LNG carriers arrived in southern Spain 15 days after the stopping of the Maghreb-Europe pipeline passing through Morocco, as the Algerian authorities pledged to supply Spain with additional quantities of liquefied natural gas.

In this context, a report by Canal Sur (Spanish Southern TV) stated that a giant Algerian LNG tanker docked a few days ago in the port of Huelva in the south of the Kingdom, to supply the country with quantities of liquefied gas.

The report pointed out that the Algerian gas tanker had unloaded its cargo at the port of Huelva, where the second largest station in the country is located to convert liquefied gas from a liquid to a gaseous state, before being directed to the production of electricity.

The video, which Echorouk reviewed, shows the giant Algerian gas tanker “Ougarta-Ougarta”, anchored at the Spanish port of “Huelva”, and unloaded its cargo of liquefied natural gas.

In the same context, through a browsing process carried out by “Echorouk”, for the global website for tracking the movement of ships, the Algerian gas tanker “Al-Wakrata” appears, and it left the Spanish port of Sagunto (northeast of Valencia) on Monday at 11 am, which means that the tanker unloaded a cargo at the Sagunto port, which has a facility for the Spanish company “Sagas” specialized in converting gas from a liquid to a gaseous state, days after unloading its cargo at the port of Huelva in southern Spain on the Atlantic Ocean.

These developments come in implementation of the pledge of the Algerian authorities, led by Mr. Abdelmadjid Tebboune, President of the Republic, and Minister of Energy, Mohamed Arkab, to ensure Spain’s LNG supplies with additional quantities of liquefied natural gas on board the fleet of ships, in addition to the capabilities of the direct “Medgaz” pipeline transfer between Algeria (Beni Saf) and Spain (Almeria), which currently stands at 8 billion cubic meters and will reach 10.7 billion cubic meters before the end of the current year.

The Algerian liquefied natural gas tanker “Al-Wakrata” is considered the largest in the fleet of the “Hybrok” company, a branch of the national hydrocarbon company “Sonatrach”, with a capacity of 171,800 cubic meters, a length of 291.5 meters, and a crew of 32 people.

For reference, the fleet of “Hybrok” company, Sonatrach branch, has 6 LNG carriers, “Al-Warqata”, “Tessala”, “Lalla Fatima N’Soumer”, “Abbane Ramdane”, “Cheikh Bouamama” and “Cheikh Al-Mokrani”.

In total, the tonnage of the six tankers of the Sonatrach fleet (Hybrok) is 765 thousand and 177 cubic meters, not counting the chartered tankers that can be resorted to or the tankers of Sonatrach’s branch in London that can be relied upon if necessary.

The natural gas liquefaction capacities of the national hydrocarbon company

Sonatrach amount to about 30 billion cubic meters annually, through the Skikda and Arzew sea ports.