Petrobras ends Golar’s FSRU contract

Brazilian oil company Petrobras has terminated early a charter contract with Golar LNG for the Golar Spirit FSRU. 

The company’s 1981-built floating, storage, and regasification unit (FSRU) Golar Spirit has been on hire in Brazil since 2008 and operating since 2009, under a 10-year contract with Petrobras.

Golar LNG Partners said on Tuesday that, as provisioned under the terms of the contract, the company received a notice of early termination of the Golar Spirit charter from charterers Petrobras. The charter end date will now be June 21, 2017.

The original end date of the charter was August 2018. In accordance with the terms of the charter, charterers will pay to the company a compensation fee as a result of the early termination representing approximately 62% of the EBITDA remaining under the contract from June 21, 2017, to the original contract end date.

The company added it will immediately start re-marketing the vessel for FSRU employment post June 2017. Golar noted that there is currently significant interest and bidding activity in the FSRU market and also a limited number of FSRUs available for the next two years.

Golar LNG concluded that Golar Spirit, as a relatively small capacity FSRU, could be well suited for a number of emerging smaller scale FSRU projects as well as a potential bridging solution for larger projects.