King & Spalding advised BW Gas in connection with its successful tender to provide Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company ( EGAS ) with LNG regasification services utilizing a Floating Storage Regasification Unit (FSRU) in Ain Sokhna, Egypt.
BW’s FSRU, named “BW Singapore,” built at Samsung Heavy Industries (SHI) in Korea, will be utilised for this project and offers an environmentally friendly and efficient solution to EGAS at a strategically important juncture for a country facing a chronic gas shortage.
Local demand has increased significantly in recent years against a backdrop of declining domestic production. The FSRU has storage capacity in excess of 170,000 cubic metres and a peak regasification capacity of 750 million standard cubic feet per day. The BW Singapore will be delivered by the end of September 2015 in Ain Sokhna Port and will commence operations in October 2015.
BW is a leading international gas shipping company with more than 75 years of maritime energy transportation history and 40 years of operational experience in LNG. BW’s current fleet consists of 21 LNG carriers including new-builds, and BW is the world’s largest owner and operator of Very Large Gas Carriers and a leading player in tankers and Floating Storage and Offloading units (FPSOs).
The King & Spalding legal team representing BW Gas was led by energy partners Dan Rogers (Houston/Singapore) and Merrick White (Singapore) and energy associate Nick Kouvaritakis (Singapore). Further assistance was provided by arbitration partner Elodie Dulac (Singapore), arbitration associate Kevin Lim (Singapore), energy associate Ji-Nin Loh (Houston), finance partner Nabil Issa (Dubai/Riyadh) and finance senior associate Simon Rahimzada (Abu Dhabi).
“This is an important project for BW Gas as it enters the ever-growing Middle-East LNG regasification and storage market,” said Ken Culotta, head of King & Spalding ‘s Global Transactions Practice. “That market has expanded significantly in recently years, with floating regasification projects having already commenced operations in Jordan, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. We are delighted to have been given the opportunity to advise BW Gas on this landmark project.”
King & Spalding ‘s LNG practice is one of the most active and experienced in the world. With a deep bench of more than 100 energy lawyers who regularly handle LNG matters, the firm has been counselling clients on LNG projects, transactions and disputes globally from the early 1990s through the industry’s recent unprecedented growth. The firm’s LNG team has expertise in every aspect of the field, from upstream projects and liquefaction to construction, financing, arbitration and litigation, shipping, sales, import projects and downstream gas marketing. In addition, many of team members have served in key in-house roles at leading global energy companies and as leaders of energy industry trade groups, providing the firm with more than two decades of unique insight into the commercial aspects of the business.
Earlier this year, King & Spalding reinforced its Asia energy team by recruiting to the Singapore office Richard Nelson, former head of the Southeast Asia energy practice at Herbert Smith Freehills, and Simon Cowled, a power projects partner from Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. Chambers ranks several King & Spalding practices in Singapore, noting its work in International Arbitration (Band 1) and Energy & Natural Resources (Band 1).
Source: Zawya
