This research proposed to establish a quantitative assessment framework for a site selection study of liquefied natural gas (LNG) receiving terminal by considering both chemical process safety and marine transportation safety.
The offshore LNG terminal, referred as LNG floating storage unit (FSU) or floating storage and re-gasification unit (FSRU), performs well on both building and operation processes. The LNG FSRU system is a cost-effective and time efficient solution for LNG transferring in the offshore area, and it brings minimal impacts to the surrounding environment as well. This paper proposed an evaluation framework for LNG FSRU system site selection. The evaluation framework was adopted to process a comparison study between two possible locations for LNG offshore FSU/FSRU. This research divided the whole process into three, beginning with the LNG Carrier navigating in the inbound channel, through the berthing operation and ending with the completion of LNG transferring operation. The preferred location is determined by simultaneously evaluating navigation safety, berthing safety and LNG transferring safety objectives based on the quantitative multi-hierarchy framework multi-attribute decision analysis (QMFMADA) method. The maritime safety analysis, including navigational process and berthing process, was simulated by LNG ship simulator DMU V-Dragon 3000A and analyzed by statistical software such as R and JMP. The chemical process safety simulation was employed to LNG transferring events such as connection hose rupture, flange failure by the consequence simulation tool Safeti. Two scenarios, i.e., worst case scenario and maximum credible scenario, were taken into consideration by inputting different data of evaluating parameters. The QMFMADA method transformed the evaluation criteria to one comparable unit, risk utility value, to evaluate the different alternatives. Based on the final value of the simulation, the preferred location can be determined and the mitigation measures were presented accordingly
