[The speed and creativity of U.S. energy companies]

[The speed and creativity of U.S. energy companies]

There is a company called NFE (New Fortress Energy). It specializes in handling LNG on a small scale. Even on a small scale, it is worth tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of tons a year, and it mainly supplies to island areas in the Caribbean region.

Three years ago, this company proposed a novel concept of marine plant business. There have been many drilling jack-ups that have been neglected since the collapse of oil prices in 2015, and they are used to make FLNG facilities that produce LNG at sea cheap and fast. Technically, it is fixed LNG because the leg is fixed on the sea floor, but since it has been playing language, NFE calls it Fast LNG.

Each of the three jack-ups is equipped with a utility module, a gas processing module, and an LNG liquefaction module. The LNG produced is sent to the LNG ship that is just floating on the side. The traditional LNG FPSO integrates all of these functions into a huge marine plant, and NFE's FLNG separates them into four parts. It may seem crazy at first glance, but in a fixed platform type of marine plant, there are many cases in which functions are divided into several platforms and the produced oil is stored in FSO. This was applied to the LNG field.

Theoretically, there's a lot of risk, even if it's possible. Difficulties in connecting each module, problems in commissioning at sea, and problems can occur when connecting to LNG storage facilities by flexible hose, and it can explode. Hurricane could cause LNG storage facilities to collide with production facilities. So, I don't really think about implementing these ideas with LNG, but I did implement NFE. Amazing. It may seem crude, but LNG production capacity is 1.4MTPA, which is a little more than Petronas FLNG SATU, which is dry in Korea. The cost of construction is probably less than half the cost. The economy is incomparable.

American energy companies are creative and are not afraid of adventure. It is also American companies that commercialize shale oil and gas. I envy the entrepreneurial spirit of putting it into action when everyone hesitates to be dangerous, and I worry about what we should live on if the world's strongest country is good at this.