The European Investment Bank (EIB) has granted a EUR 240 million loan to IREN S.p.A. to complete the regasification plant in Livorno created by its subsidiary OLT Offshore Toscana. The project comes under sectors in which the EIB is traditionally active – energy and environmental protection.
In technical terms, the project consists of a floating terminal for the import, storage and regasification of liquefied natural gas, moored 22 km from the Tuscan coast and connected to the mainland by a submarine and overland pipeline approximately 30 km long to send gas to the national grid. The initial authorised capacity for gas imports will be 3.75bn standard cubic metres per annum (the standard cubic metre is the unit of measurement of volume used for gases in “standard” conditions, i.e. at a specific atmospheric pressure and at a temperature of 15° C).
OLT Offshore Toscana is the promoter of the terminal project situated on the central Italian coast and holds the permits to build and operate the plant. The company’s leading shareholders are the German energy group E.ON (46.8%) and the IREN Group (46.8%), an Italian multi-utility listed on the Milan stock exchange.
240 million Euros = 323.01600 million U.S. dollars
[mappress] World Maritime News Staff, December 2, 2011; Image: OLT Offshore