Maran Gas Achilles

No other tracked vessel shares this yard, delivery year and capacity.

• LNG carrier anatomy

  An LNG carrier is a ship built around insulated cargo tanks that hold liquefied gas at minus 162 degrees, with an engine able to burn the cargo vapour that inevitably boils off during the voyage.

• Membrane versus Moss tanks

  Cargo containment is the system that holds LNG at minus 162 degrees inside a ship, and it comes in two families: membranes, which are thin barriers supported by the hull, and free-standing tanks, which carry their own load.

• Propulsion II: DFDE and TFDE, the dual-fuel era

  Dual-fuel diesel electric propulsion uses medium-speed engines burning either boil-off gas or liquid fuel to generate electricity, which drives electric propulsion motors rather than a directly coupled shaft.

• Ship classes: conventional, Q-Flex, Q-Max and small-scale

  LNG carriers fall into recognised size classes running from small-scale vessels under 30,000 cubic metres, through the 174,000 cubic metre conventional standard, to the 266,000 cubic metre Q-Max ships built for Qatar.