Woodfibre LNG announced in a statement last week that it has received regulatory approval from the BC Environmental Assessment Office, the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada, and the Squamish Nation for a second floating workforce accommodation vessel, or floatel.
This regulatory approval marks another “major construction milestone and reinforces Woodfibre LNG’s safe, low-impact, and environmentally responsible approach to workforce housing,” the company said.
Earlier this year, Woodfibre LNG announced that it would apply to regulatory agencies to add a second workplace accommodation floatel.
According to the JV, the second floatel will “enable the creation of up to 900 new jobs right away and add 642 new rooms for skilled tradespeople to work at the site.”
Bringing additional workforce on site will be “crucial” in completing facility construction as quickly as possible and bringing more Canadian LNG to global markets, Woodfibre LNG noted.
The first floatel, Isabelle X, has been successfully operating at site since June 2024.
Moreover, Saga X is expected to arrive in Vancouver on November 12, at which time it will undergo some final refits, provisioning, and regulatory inspections.
The vessel will then sail to and be moored at the Woodfibre LNG site later in the month.
All regulatory conditions governing the first floatel will also apply to second, Woodfibre LNG said.
Similar to the first floatel, Vancouver-based Bridgemans is the provider and operator of the new floatel.
Following the successful retrofit of the vessel, Bridgemans will sail Saga X to the Woodfibre LNG site and run its operations on a day-to-day basis.
$8.8 billion
Woodfibre LNG now expects that the construction of its 2.1 mtpa LNG export facility near Squamish, British Columbia, will cost $8.8 billion.
It previously expected that the construction of the facility would cost $5.1 billion.
Woodfibre LNG’s facility has already passed its halfway point to project completion.
In May this year, Woodfibre LNG took delivery of the first seven modules from China at the site of its LNG export facility.
China’s Qingdao McDermott Wuchuan (QMW), a joint venture consisting of McDermott and China State Shipbuilding Corporation, built and shipped these modules.
QMW will build 19 modules, some weighing in excess of 10,000 metric tonnes, for Woodfibre LNG.
While construction on-site began in September 2023, the LNG project has adopted a modular construction approach to enhance efficiency and meet its construction timeline.
The JV plans to complete the facility, which will have a storage of about 250,000 cbm, in 2027.
