The claim
Posts are spreading on Facebook claiming that 20 liquid gas tankers transporting liquid gas from the USA to Europe use as much heavy oil for their journey as all vehicles worldwide use for fuel.
Our conclusion
LNG tankers do not run on heavy oil, but almost exclusively on so-called boil-off gas, which is produced automatically during gas transport. The annual global energy demand for vehicles, calculated in kWh regardless of the type of fuel, is many times the energy demand of 20 LNG tankers.
The false claim is made in this post , which has now been shared almost 25,000 times.
Afterwards, 20 ships with a capacity of 140,000 m³ of liquefied natural gas (LNG) are said to have been sent from the USA to Europe. These tankers are supposed to use as much heavy oil for the crossing as the amount of fuel used by all vehicles in the world in a year. The source of the gas is stated to be gas extraction using fracking technology. A connection to the Greens is also made; Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck is pictured in the foreground. It is not clear why exactly the Greens are being congratulated.
There is a lot wrong with this post, and it is already being played on Facebook with only a DPA fact check ( HERE ).
The facts
LNG liquid gas tankers use only a fraction of the world's annual fuel consumption. They are powered by liquid gas, which has moved from its liquid state back into the gaseous state during transport. Heavy oil plays no role here at all. Gas and oil are two completely different forms of energy. So apples are being compared with oranges.
What is Liquefied Gas?
Liquid gas, or LNG, is liquefied natural gas. Included
“The natural gas is cryogenic at a temperature of approximately -163 °C. The volume of LNG is less than 0.2% of the gas volume, so it can be stored and/or transported (ships or land vehicles) efficiently and with a high energy density. Before liquefaction, impurities such as water, acids, heavier liquids, carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulfide (H2S), nitrogen and helium are removed and the gas is dried. LNG is non-toxic and non-corrosive, but requires more effort when stored in cryogenic tanks than e.g. B. gaseous methane.”
(HERE)
During transport in special tankers, a minimal part of the liquefied natural gas changes back into the gaseous state and evaporates. This resulting gas is called boil-off gas and must be removed from the tanks in order to keep the pressure conditions in the tank stable ( HERE ). It is precisely this gas that powers the tankers. To drive the tankers, fuel is used that is already on board and results from the transport process. Alternatively, the boil-off gas (BOG) would have to be burned ( HERE ). The boil-off rate of a large tanker is around 0.1% per day
A model calculation
In a model calculation by DPA, the situation is as follows ( HERE ):
At around 17 knots per day, a tanker needs around 8 days to travel the almost 6,200 km from the American east coast to Rotterdam and therefore uses between 0.8 to 1% of its load for propulsion. An average LNG tanker holds around 150,000 m³ of liquid gas. This means that around 1,500 m³ are used for the crossing. For 20 tankers, this corresponds to an energy consumption of approximately 840,000 kilowatt hours (kWh) ( HERE ).
For Germany, the statistics show annual fuel consumption of around 42 billion liters in 2020 ( HERE ). The calorific value is the equivalent of approx. 171,600,000 kWh. This means that the German consumption of energy from gasoline and diesel alone exceeds the consumption of the 20 LNG tankers mentioned by at least twice. If the global consumption of gasoline and diesel to power vehicles were taken into account, it would become clear how absurd the comparison mentioned in the post is. If you would like to do further calculations, you can find the relevant data here ( HERE ). However, this information is no longer necessary for the fact check here.
The criticism that it's fracked gas would most likely be accurate if the post itself was accurate. In the USA, natural gas is no longer only obtained conventionally through drilling, but fracking technology, which has been heavily criticized, is increasingly being used ( HERE ).
The 20 ships
The post states an exact number of tankers that are currently on their way to Europe. Despite research, where this information comes from remains unclear. The fact is that information is circulating online that the USA would send a fleet of tankers to Europe and thereby thwart Putin's gas calculations. The exact number of 20 tankers also falls here. If you read these articles (e.g. HERE and HERE ) inaccurately, you might get the impression that they describe the current situation in which Europe is specifically trying to purchase additional liquefied gas resources on the world market in the wake of the current sanctions against the warmonger Russia, in order to, if possible to quickly become independent of Russian gas.
The small flaw is in the date.
These articles appeared in December, more precisely on December 24th, 2021. At this point it was clear that the energy supply situation was becoming increasingly critical, national gas storage facilities were at a low point and gas prices were spiraling ever upwards. At this point there were also initial attempts to purchase additional gas. So they have nothing to do with the situation triggered by the outbreak of the Ukrainian war. Or only indirectly if one interprets the emptied gas storage facilities as a preparatory measure by Russia for war. At the end of March it was announced that the EU had agreed on further gas deliveries from the USA. Initially, an additional 15 million m³ will be delivered and expanded to a total of 50 million m³. There was no mention of 20 LNG tankers currently on the way ( HERE ).
Since the criticized post appeared shortly afterwards on March 28th, one can certainly assume a direct connection to the Ukraine war and the EU gas deal in March. As shown in the model calculation above, tankers across the Atlantic take around 8 days. The tankers to which the press releases in December referred had therefore arrived long ago. Other reports that specifically refer to 20 tankers that are currently on their way to Europe (around March 28th) cannot be found. It should be noted that this would not be relevant with regard to the main fake, the comparison of energy costs for transport.
Transport costs of natural gas in comparison
The post implies that it is uneconomical to transport LNG gas by tanker.
The counter-proposal is transport by pipeline, as it has been practiced so far, and would have been raised to a new level with Nord Stream 2 if the project had not been stopped as a result of the sanctions. However, due to the relatively low energy density of natural gas, transport via pipeline is more expensive when it comes to long distances. This not only affects the necessary investment costs, but also the operating costs. From 2,000 km onwards, shipping LNG by tanker is cheaper than via pipeline. So if Europe relies on transatlantic natural gas, then these are distances that go well beyond this tipping point. “In order to compensate for pressure losses that occur during transport over long distances, the natural gas must be recompressed approximately every 100-200 km. Gas turbines that run on pipeline gas are used in the compressor stations. When transported over very long distances, they create significant internal demand for the pipeline. It can be estimated that for the transport of natural gas from Siberian sources to Western Europe (distance approx. 5000 km) more than 10 percent of the gas fed into the pipeline is used for the operation of the pipeline." ( HERE )
If you compare the two values, the further distance transport via LNG tanker across the Atlantic only “costs” a tenth of the gas as transport via pipeline from Siberia (please always keep in mind that these are rough model calculations).

Conclusion
The statement that the delivery of natural gas in 20 liquid gas tankers from the USA to Europe uses as much heavy oil as the total annual fuel consumption for all vehicles in the world is wrong.
LNG tankers do not run on heavy oil, but almost exclusively on so-called boil-off gas, which is produced automatically during gas transport. On the contrary, the annual global energy demand for vehicles, calculated in kWh regardless of the type of fuel, is many times the energy demand of 20 LNG tankers.
It is unclear where the information came from that 20 LNG tankers were on their way to Europe at the time of the Facebook post. However, such a specific number of tankers was reported in the media at the turn of the year.
You might also be interested in: Energy price madness continues
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Notes:
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