Leading classification society ClassNK (Chairman and President: Noboru Ueda) has released its Guidelines for Floating Offshore Facilities for LNG/LPG Production, Storage Offloading and Regasification (Third Edition).

The first edition of the guidelines laid out specific technical requirements for gas FPSOs and was released in 2011. In February 2015, the guidelines were revised and the second edition was released to clarify the application to FSRUs.

Key industry players, as well as ClassNK and Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism recently gathered to discuss how to further enhance the safe design of FLNG. Based on the outcomes of this discussion, ClassNK has developed the third edition of its guidelines. Updates include specific requirements of mooring analysis of single-point mooring systems, such as turret mooring systems*. The combination of environmental conditions to be considered and statistical analysis methods using tension evaluation are set out in detail in the guidelines. Requirements for fire protection, fire extinction and so on have also been partly revised.

*Turret mooring uses the connection of bearings joining the mooring cables and hull structure to automatically rotate the hull structure in the direction where external forces such as waves, wind and tidal currents are minimized.