Singapore — A liquefied natural gas tanker has loaded a cargo from Russia’s Portovaya LNG plant that is under Western sanctions over Moscow’s war in Ukraine, ship-tracking data showed.
The Kunpeng arrived at the Portovaya LNG terminal, was unloaded on December 18 and departed with a cargo on December 21, according to ship-tracking data from analytics firm Kpler. LSEG data also shows the tanker arriving and leaving the terminal on the same dates.
This is the first time that the Kunpeng, which is not under sanctions, has picked up an LNG cargo from a designated project. Until last year, the Kunpeng mostly delivered LNG to South Korea from Qatar and Australia, Kpler data showed.
Shipping database Equasis lists the tanker’s registered owner and its ship or commercial manager as Reveka Marine Ltd, with a registered address in the Marshall Islands.
Reuters could not find contact information for Reveka Marine Ltd.
Washington placed sanctions on two Russian LNG terminals, including Portovaya, at the start of this year.
Its annual export volumes were already low at less than 2 million metric tons per year, shipping mostly to Europe and Turkey and the number of loadings decreased following the sanctions.
It nevertheless shipped five cargoes domestically to Kaliningrad, Russia.
One cargo, however, was delivered to a tanker in Southeast Asian waters in October, making it the first known ship-to-ship transfer of Russian LNG subject to sanctions.
Another LNG shipment was delivered to China’s Beihai LNG terminal on December 8 via the Valera tanker, the first delivered cargo from Portovaya to a receiving terminal outside of Russia since the sanctions on Portovaya.
Beihai LNG terminal has only received LNG under sanctions from Russia since August.
Reporting by Emily Chow; editing by Barbara Lewis – Reuters
