Six major shipping lines, including Mitsui, Exmar, Qatar Shipping and Essar - are left in the fray for supply of three liquefied natural gas (LNG) tankers for Petronet LNG (PLL), India's first LNG importing company.State-run Shipping Corporation of India (SCI) and Great Eastern Shipping Company have put in two bids each. SCI teamed up with Mitsui OSK Line, NYK Line and K Line for one bid, and the second bid was made in association with Qatar Shipping and Isle of Man-based Dorchester Maritime. Great Eastern has bid with Malaysian International Shipping Corporation and Teekay Shipping.While Esmar Marine NV bid jointly with Indian Oil Corp and Varun Shipping, Essar Shipping and Golar LNG joined forces to bid for the tender, a top official of PLL said.PLL, which already has two 1,38,000-cubic metre capacity ship ferrying LNG from Qatar to the Dahej terminal, needs two more LNG tankers of similar capacity for hauling an additional 5 million tonne to Dahej. PLL also wants a 1,52,000-1,65,000 cubic metres capacity ship for the Kochi terminal. "Eight consortiums had submitted expression of interest for the contract in January. But two - Foresight and the consortirum of SCI-Irano Hind-IR-Iran Shipping - were disqualified as they did not meet the threshold criteria," the official said.PLL is expanding the capacity of the Dahej LNG terminal from 5 million tonne to 10 million tonne per annum at an estimated cost of Rs 1,000 crore, and is setting up a Rs 2,000 crore LNG receiving terminal at Cochin with an initial capacity of 2.5 million tonne, which can be scaled up to 5 million tonne per annum.
