Italy’s Snam has stumped up $350 million to buy the Golar Tundra liquefied natural gas floating storage and regasification unit from Golar LNG.

Golar LNG noted the LNG import facility will help safeguard Italy’s energy security and diversification.

The Golar Tundra can operate both as an LNG carrier and as an FSRU. The vessel, built in 2015, has storage capacity of around 170,000 cubic metres of LNG and a continuous regasification capacity of 5 billion cubic metres per annum.

In order to maximise its regasification capacity, the vessel will be located in central-northern Italy, close to areas with the greatest gas consumption.