China National Offshore Oil Corp.'s (CNOOC) Ningbo LNG terminal received its first shipment of Qatari LNG yesterday, a source with the Ningbo Maritime Safety Administration (MSA) confirmed with Interfax today.

The LNG carrier Zarga began unloading 94,000 tons of QatarGas LNG yesterday afternoon, Chen Yin, spokesman for Ningbo MSA, said, adding that the vessel will complete offloading in ten days.

Construction of the first phase of the Ningbo LNG terminal wrapped up in March following almost two and a half years of construction at a cost of RMB 6.97 billion ($1.11 billion). The port facility currently features one wharf and three 160,000-cubic meter storage tanks.

The terminal's second phase, scheduled for completion in 2015, will bring the total price tag of the project up to RMB 28.6 billion ($4.54 billion) and is expected to double the annual receiving capacity to 6 million tons per year, Zhuochuang Information analyst Li Lingxuan told Interfax today.

"The first shipment of LNG [will be] used for the terminal's pre-commission checks. Another shipment will arrive next month and the terminal will start to sell the trucked LNG [during] the same period," said Li. The analyst added that the combination of the terminal start-up and an influx of supplies from new processing plants will exert downward pressure on trucked LNG prices next month.

China has five LNG receiving terminals with a combined 15.8 million tons of annual throughput capacity, Interfax previously reported.

The Ningbo terminal is CNOOC's fourth operational regasification facility. The state-owned energy giant operates LNG receiving projects in Shanghai, Putian City in Fujian Province and Dapeng County in Shenzhen, announced plans to begin construction of a second LNG terminal in Fujian in the first half of the year, according to a source with the National Development and Reform Commission (see: CNOOC to build LNG terminal in Longhai 22 February 2012).