What's 1,601ft long and weighs 600,000 tonnes but floats?

Worlds largest 'ship', which is bigger than the Empire State Building, takes to the water for first time

South Korean shipbuilder Samsung Heavy Industries floated partially built tanker-shaped vessel - Prelude - at its southern shipyard in Geoje Liquefied natural gas platform cannot be called a ship as it is unable to move under its own steam and must be towed Vessel's storage tanks have a capacity equivalent to approximately 175 Olympic swimming pools Commissioned by Dutch energy giant Shell, the facility is due to be delivered by September 2016 Prelude will operate in a remote basin around 295 miles northeast of Broome, Australia, for around 25 years

By NICK ENOCH
PUBLISHED: 20:26 GMT, 5 December 2013 | UPDATED: 21:31 GMT, 5 December 2013

Pity the poor deck hands on this monster. Its bow and stern are half a kilometre apart and you could fit four football pitches onto it. Now, the world's largest 'floating facility', which is longer than the height of the Empire State Building, has taken to the water for the first time. South Korean shipbuilder Samsung Heavy Industries floated the partially built tanker-shaped vessel - named Prelude - at its southern shipyard in Geoje on November 30. The 1,601ft -long (488m) floating liquefied natural gas (FLNG) platform cannot be described as a ship because it is unable to move under its own steam and must be towed.

The liquefied natural gas platform, called Prelude, is the world's largest 'floating facility'. Longer than the height of the Empire State Building, it has taken to the water, off the coast of South Korea, for the first time

At 242ft wide and 360ft high, it is expected to produce 3.6m tonnes of liquefied natural gas a year - and its storage tanks have a capacity equivalent to approximately 175 Olympic swimming pools

But its specifications are impressive, outstripping the 1,453ft (443m)-tall Empire State Building in New York. Once complete, the facility will weigh more than 600,000 tonnes fully loaded, displacing the same amount of water as six of the world's largest aircraft carriers. And at 242ft wide and 360ft high, it is expected to produce 3.6million tonnes of LNG a year - and its storage tanks have a capacity equivalent to approximately 175 Olympic swimming pools. Commissioned by the Dutch energy giant Shell, the vessel is due to be delivered by September 2016. In a press release on its website, Shell said Prelude would operate in a remote basin around 295 miles northeast of Broome, a town in Western Australia, for around 25 years. It is an all-weather facility designed to withstand the most powerful category-five cyclone. Which is just as well as it will be producing enough gas to supply a city the size of Hong Kong.

The 1,601ft (488m)-long floating liquefied natural gas platform cannot be described as a ship because it is unable to move under its own steam and must be towed

A FLOTATION WORTH BILLIONS

Shell has shied away from offering estimates of Prelude's likely cost, but analysts say FLNG could end up less expensive. It has put the cost of Prelude at up to 7.7billion ($12.6bn). At 600,000 tonnes with its storage tanks full, Prelude will be vast, but it takes up just a quarter of the space a land-based LNG plant of a similar capacity would occupy because components are stacked on top of each other. LNG plants need access to the ocean anyway so that LNG tankers can load. FLNG eliminates the need for land purchase and reduces environmental objections. With cooling water straight from the ocean and gas piped straight into LNG tankers, there is no need for long seabed pipelines and jetty construction. Shell's earliest FLNG designs were made in the 1990s but ended up shelved because of the economic recession and technical difficulties. The company started looking again at the idea in the early 2000s, but it was the discovery of the Prelude field in 2007 - too small and too remote to develop any other way that gave the technology its first shot in the real world. A final investment decision was taken to go ahead with the Prelude in 2011. Its keel was laid in May this year and two giant sections of its hull built on opposite sides of the harbour were joined together in the summer at Geoje Island.

We're gonna need an even BIGGER boat?

As Prelude leaves dry dock for the first time, developer Royal Dutch Shell wants to consolidate its advantage as the first mover in floating liquefied natural gas - an as-yet untried technology for which Prelude will be the flagship. The oil company's technicians are designing something even larger and tougher than Prelude, a vessel that will need to last 25 years moored in the Indian Ocean's 'cyclone alley' off Australia's northwest coast. 'Yes we will move bigger and move into more extreme environments,' said Bruce Steenson, Shell's general manager of integrated gas programmes and innovation. 'We are designing a larger facility. That will be the next car off the rails.' Prelude, which analysts says may cost over 7billion ($12bn) to build, is a potential game changer for the oil and gas industry. If it is an economic success, gas fields worldwide that are too far out to sea and too small to develop any other way could become viable for LNG production. The prototype vessel's most likely first copy model of similar size will now be for the Browse project - another venture for gas off Australia. Escalating costs forced backers to dump their original, land-based LNG plant plans, and in September this year, they decided to go ahead with Shell's FLNG technology instead. 'The Browse structure will be 90 per cent the same as Prelude,' said Steenson - citing the 'design one, build many' mantra Shell hopes will eventually pay off and placate shareholders worried about the firm's total $45billion-a-year capital spending bill. Browse's developer, Woodside Petroleum, said in October it may use as many as three of the FLNG vessels that Shell is developing along with Samsung Heavy and oil and gas engineers Technip. An even bigger FLNG plant than the ones to be built for Prelude and Browse could make life more interesting for the competition. A wide range of land-based 'wannabe' LNG exporters in Canada, Russia and east Africa all hope to tap the burgeoning Asian gas demand in the same way a number of Australian and U.S-based LNG developments will be doing over the coming few years. Anchored about 125 miles off the Australian coast, Prelude will chill the gas to reduce its volume by a factor of 600 and load it on to specialised LNG tankers. Prelude will only produce about 3.6 million tonnes a year (mtpa) of LNG along with its 5.3 mtpa of liquids and other hydrocarbons - a fraction of some land-based LNG plants. Steenson envisages a bigger version could produce far more - giving it economies of scale closer to those to be enjoyed by bigger land-based producing plants such as Gorgon, a 15.6 mtpa plant taking shape on northwest Australia's coast to tap offshore gas. Gorgon, led by Shell's US-based rival Chevron, should be producing in early 2015, well ahead of Prelude, but it is way over budget and now scheduled to cost 31billion ($52bn) against an original 23billion ($37bn). Plans for a land-based Browse plant were cancelled this year as its likely cost reached 27billion ($45bn), and the outlook for global gas demand faltered.

The Prelude's specifications are impressive, outstripping the 1,453ft (443m)-tall Empire State Building in New York (right)

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