Lithuania to buy floating liquefied gas terminal

VILNIUS, Lithuania – Lithuanian lawmakers have voted to buy a floating liquefied natural gas terminal that has been providing gas to the Baltic nation as it tries to reduce its reliance on Russian energy.

In Tuesday’s 99-1 vote with 17 lawmakers abstaining, parliament voted to buy the 300-meter (984-foot) Independence from a Norwegian company, Hoegh LNG AS. The terminal has been docked off Lithuania’s coast since 2014 and is used to supply natural gas from Norway.

The vessel is estimated to cost some 308 million euros ($349 million). Lithuania plans to buy it by 2025.

In 2017, Russia’s state-owned Gazprom accounted for about 54 per cent of all energy supplies to Lithuania. Some 61.3 per cent of all gas was imported via the Independence terminal.