Chart Ferox ISO Containers Facilitate First LNG on Madeira Island

Chart Ferox ISO Containers Facilitate First LNG on Madeira Island

An initial fleet out of forty specially constructed ISO containers, designed and built by Chart Ferox, was used to supply approximately 500m³ of LNG by Grupo Sousa – Gáslink Gás Natural S.A to Madeira Electricity Company’s Thermo Electric Power Plant – CTVIII, on Madeira island.

The first LNG shipment was loaded into fourteen Chart Ferox ISO containers at Sines LNG terminal on Portugal’s mainland, and transported through the Port of Lisbon more than 950 Km by sea, before a further road journey to Portugal’s newest satellite LNG plant, and the only one located on an island.

This process of delivering natural gas to regions not connected to a national grid is called a virtual pipeline.

“Chart Ferox is proud of its role in bringing the environmental and economic benefits of natural gas to the island of Madeira and would like to place on record our thanks to our project partners in the Grupo Sousa organization, with whom we are able to address all the logistical and technical challenges this pioneering project presented. Together we can declare that the LNG virtual pipeline concept is now a reality on Madeira,” the company said in a statement.

The virtual pipeline solution is fully flexible and can be adapted to suit the island’s future power demand. It utilizes existing port resources, including maritime cargo handling, container ships in regular cabotage, roads, trucks and manpower, and does not require any additional port infrastructure or capabilities.

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Press Release, April 15, 2014; Image: Chart Ferox