Third Northern Lights LCO2 carrier blessed, now preparing for service

April 9, 2026, by Nadja Skopljak

Northern Phoenix, the third liquefied carbon dioxide (LCO2) carrier for the Northern Lights CO2 project in Norway, has officially been blessed and will now start final preparations and commissioning ahead of operations.

China’s Dalian Shipbuilding Industry (DSIC), part of China State Shipbuilding Corporation (CSSC), delivered the LCO2 carrier to the Northern Lights joint venture (JV), encompassing Shell, Equinor, and TotalEnergies, in December 2025.

The naming ceremony took place at Festningskaien in Bergen and the ship was blessed by Linn Hamre, one of the first Northern Lights employees, selected through an internal initiative to appoint a godmother from within the organization.

Northern Phoenix will transport captured CO2 from Yara to the receiving terminal in Øygarden, where it will be stored beneath the seabed. The ship will now start final preparations and commissioning ahead of operations.

“With our first two ships already in operation, Northern Phoenix marks the next step in scaling our CO2 shipping capacity. We look forward to continuing to grow our fleet and enabling safe and reliable CO2 transport across Europe,” said Tim Heijn, Managing Director of Northern Lights JV.

With a cargo tank capacity of 7,500 cubic meters (cbm), overall length of 130 meters, and breadth of 21 meters, the ship’s cargo transport conditions indicate a maximum pressure of 19 bar(g) and minimum temperature of -35 C.

While the primary fuel is LNG, the liquefied CO2 carrier comes with low-carbon technologies, including wind-assisted rotor sail and air lubrication. The fourth vessel is also coming along, as the keel laying ceremony was held in December 2024, a year after the shipbuilding order was placed.

To remind, Equinor, Shell and TotalEnergies injected and stored the first CO2 volumes as part of the Northern Lights project in August 2025, marking the start of operations of what is said to be the world’s first third-party CO2 transport and storage facility.