Hammerfest LNG Plant in Norway will be closed for maintenance from July until August

Equinor announced that its Hammerfest LNG Terminal, Europe's biggest liquefied gas export facility, was shut down on Tuesday for planned annual maintenance.

According to a regulatory document, the maintenance outage, which began at 0400 GMT at the Hammerfest LNG plant (also known as Melkoeya LNG), is expected to last until 10 July.

A spokesperson for Equinor confirmed that the company had begun an extensive maintenance shutdown to ensure robust operation for "at least 3 new years".

The spokesperson said that this included preparations for future Melkoeya projects as well regular maintenance tasks, such as changing valves, heating cable and other parts as well cleaning the pipe system.

Melkoeya LNG is capable of delivering about 6.5 billion cubic meters of gas annually, which would be enough to power about 6.5 millions European homes. It accounts for approximately 5% of Norwegian gas exports.

The island of Melkoeya receives its gas from the Snoehvit Field in the Barents sea, about 143 km away. Equinor owns the plant, as do TotalEnergies and Vaar Energi. (Reporting and editing by Terje Solsvik, Nora Buli)

(source: Reuters)