Teekay LNG Partners, one of the world’s largest marine energy transportation, storage and production companies, said start-up of its joint venture liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminal in Bahrain has been delayed to the third quarter of this year from May.

Besides the Bermuda-based Teekay LNG Partners, Bahrain LNG, which is developing the terminal, is jointly owned by the National Oil and Gas Authority (Noga) of Bahrain, Samsung Construction and Trading and the Gulf Investment Corporation.

The terminal was initially scheduled to be completed and start supplying natural gas to the Bahrain network in the first quarter of 2019, said the company while releasing its financial results for the first quarter.

The engineering phase of the project was executed by the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contractor GS Engineering and Construction (GS) of South Korea and work is now nearing completion.

“Looking ahead, we expect contract start-up of four additional LNG carrier new buildings and the Bahrain LNG terminal in the second half of 2019, which we anticipate will continue to drive further growth in total adjusted ebitda throughout the rest of 2019 and into 2020,” remarked Mark Kremin, the president and CEO Teekay Gas Group.

"Despite the near-term weakness in the spot LNG carrier market since the start of the year, we have recently been able to take advantage of the improving medium-term fundamentals by securing multiple attractive charters on our LNG carriers for periods ranging from one to three years," stated Kremin.

"This has allowed us to lock-in charters at attractive rates and maximize utilisation, thereby further enhancing our earnings stability and improving our cash flows," he added.

Kremin said the company remains committed to its balanced capital allocation plan, which returns additional capital to unitholders, including the recent 36 per cent cash distribution hike, while also creating equity value through continued delivering of our balance sheet.

"The new charters that we recently secured are expected to enable Teekay LNG to delever faster and with better visibility, which provides us with greater flexibility to allocate excess capital in the future," he added.-TradeArabia News Service