Russia’s Yamal LNG Gets New Tanker for Ship-to-Ship Transfers

MOSCOW, Feb 13 (Reuters) – Russia’s liquefied natural gas plant Yamal LNG, led by Novatek, has acquired a new gas carrier for ship-to-ship operations near the Arctic port of Murmansk, ship-tracking LSEG data showed on Thursday.

That would be its fifth new tanker, used for the transhipments of the supercooled gas from Yamal LNG near Murmansk, since the start of the northern hemisphere winter season.

According to the LSEG data, the tanker called North Light is located near the island of Kildin in the Barents Sea, where LNG dispatched from Yamal is being reloaded from ice-class Arc7 tankers.

Ship-to-ship transfers usually involve moving LNG from ice-class tankers on to conventional ones, but can also be used to complicate cargo tracking amid tighter Western sanctions against Russia’s fleet and broader economy over the war in Ukraine.

Yamal LNG restarted operations in the Murmansk region last November.

North Light tanker was built in 2024 and is owned by a Singapore-registered Arctic Diamond no.2 LNG Shipping, operated by Japanese company Mitsui O.S.K. Lines (MOL) 9104.T.

(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by Emelia Sithole-Matarise)

(c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2025.

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