Gordon Stein, CFO of CleanTech Lithium, explains why CTL acquired the 23 Laguna Verde licenses. Watch the video here.
I'd agree with BP, definitely fo the hop hop off bus tour. Belfast is a very walkable city so try and stay some fairly central and you won't need any buses, taxis, etc. Titanic hotel is lovely, another option is the Europa hotel, famous as being the most bombed hotel in Europe (safe enough these days now). Both are reasonable enough as long as you book them a little in advance.
Some great bars inc The Crown and Kelly's Cellars (for the fiddly dee music).
Crumlin Road Gaol is a good tour although busy, so advise booking this before you go over.
The glass dome at the top of the Victoria Centre gives a great view around the whole city and free too.
If maritime floats your boat (soz, lol) then there's the HMS Caroline tour and also the Nomadic tour. Nomadic is a tender that was used for the Titanic and is permanently moored now in the Titanic quarter area of Belfast.
St George's Market is also a nice way to spend a few hours and they have live music there Saturday and Sunday.
If you're here for a few days or travelling outside the city I can give you a few more ideas if you want.
Ta again OT for posting these links . The kettle is on again for another cuppa and some more reading.
I'm still curious what the monetary value would be if Infa did decide to sell on the opportunity of Islandmagee to another party. There's probably 3 prices though.
1. With planning consent declined.
2. With planning consent granted (with conditions)
3. Full planning granted to proceed.
My ideal scenario is that Infa are very much involved in taking this forward (and the subsequent financial gain), but could JW maybe have had enough of this ongoing IM saga and want to get some capital into the yards to move these forward with working capital to compete for the bigger contracts without the guarantees needed ? I'm wondering where he might see the bigger opportunity or is it possible to keep all these balls in the air simultaneously ?
Time will answer this one.
Many thanks for that OT. I can't believe i missed reading this document. I had it saved to come back to, but for some reason didn't. Gonna get a cuppa here now and my head is down for some reading.
Obviously the ML decision is still in the hands of the DAERA minister awaiting a decision, and goodness knows what the decision on that will be, or even when it will be.
Giving it some thought, that from when the gas storage application was submitted a few years back, the talk of all things Hydrogen has really taken off since then. Every other word these days in energy circles seems to be this hydrogen word. There's no doubt about it that hydrogen will be the future fuel of choice, however in the meantime the transition over to hydrogen will still require massive gas reserves and the subsequent storage facilities for the same.
I'm wondering several things though. If the ML application was originally for hydrogen storage, would this have had a greater likelihood of success ? I believe it would !
Now i know that gas storage caverns can be converted for hydrogen storage, but again, would we get a better outcome on the caverns decision if this was for hydrogen storage from outset ?
Now. If Infa were to drop the gas storage caverns application and re apply for a hydrogen storage facility for the Islandmagee site, could the same analysis data be used for this application or would we be going back to scratch and the long winded timescales ? I don't know the answer to this. Anyone here know ?
Equally, should the ML decision for the gas storage caverns be negative (or have excessive conditions), but make reference to the potential for hydrogen usage, would Infa want to take up this whole process again now having the other focus of whirly windmill and big floaty boat related stuff ?
If they did, great. If they didn't, what would the value of the Islandmagee site, the research and work completed to date be worth in the open market if offered potential buyers ? ?
Obviously, if Infa did decide to sell it on it, it would be worth a lot more with all permissions granted, but what would it also be worth if sold with the potential for hydrogen storage and a couple of the big hitters wanting to get in on this hydrogen storage market ? These big hitters might be prepared to do this with the bigger legal guns to pursue it and substantially deeper pockets to fund it ?
A sale might produce quite a few million pounds to the coffers and if the fabrication contract to H & W was part of the sale condition too, that would also provide a contract value well into the 10's of millions.
Just me having too much time on my hands and thinking out loud again.
Has anyone any knowledge on the Port of Methil or lives in the vicinity that they may see comings and goings there.
Looking at Vesselfinder website I see a vessel 'Ida' has docked there this morning.
I'm hoping there might be a load of steel onboard but some local eyes might be able to give more detail.
Thanks. TTNY
https://www.vesselfinder.com/vessels/IDA-IMO-8613358-MMSI-210319000
Are many folk from here going on the 29th ?
Unfortunately I can't make it myself, but would have loved the opportunity to see the Methil yard and also get chatting to JW, AR and some of he team.
It's just a hunch, only a hunch, and nothing but a hunch, but i feel there may be some form of company announcement of positive news prior to this meet. The reason for this hunch is solely based upon that on previous public interactions I've noticed Infa have usually had something positive to put out to us masses (just before their interactions with us). It makes us PI's feel good, and has us positive prior to talking to the main men, bless us.
Watch this space over the next 7 to 8 days for the headline and the positivity ! The share price currently needs it !
From a post earlier today we've learned that a 50m+ vessel, Sand Snipe is in Appledore. The H & W twitter page simply referred to having a paint job being done on it, but apparently there's more work than that being done. There's comments now on the actual post that it's also had 'new hold bhd, some shell replacement, new genset & exhaust, new shaft bearings & seals, new rudder shaft bearings plus a range of emergent work'.
Obviously I don't expect H & W / Infa to detail every single task completed on a job, but this was good to get some more meat put on the bones of what Sand Snipe is having done (albeit that this info didn't come directly from the company).
It got me thinking though. Surely there are some H & W workers or sub contractors on this forum page ?
Now if you are, it would be great to get some meat of yas, as to what's actually happening on the shop floor these days as we're not getting much info from Infa. I wouldn't obviously expect you to divulge any sensitive information or put any job at risk by talking here but It would be good to know what's happening. This info could be posted as from yourself or if you preferred, along the lines of :-
My mate tells me the Appledore yard has a new boat in. It's . . . .
A cousin works in the Methil yard and says those jackets are well advanced in the assembly. . .
The Belfast lads i believe are keeping that new welding machine busy on . . . .
Go on folks, who knows what's happening behind those shipyard doors ? Are the guys on the ground busy or otherwise ?
Although the Azura is owned by Carnival, it's operated by P & O Cruises.
I can't recall in recent years if any other P & O cruise ships have been in Harland an Wolff, i don't believe so. We've obviously recently had European Causeway and Highlander in dry dock, but these are P & O Ferries vessels.
Not relevant to this news item but for anyone interested, one of Harland & Wolff's best well known new ship builds was a P & O liner in the late 50's, the S.S Canberra.
I've also attached a link from the Northern Echo newspaper informing us of the Azura coming to Belfast.
https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/19395432.azura-ship-will-leave-port-tyne-north-shields/
Good man Chrisatrdg staying on top of these blighters with your emails.
We can only hope that Mr Poots (not being the main man any more in the DUP), will have more time to focus on his role as DAERA minister and to get ML over the finishing line.
Way hey BP. This is the first time I've popped a recommend tick on a post you've done.
I knew you had it in you to be positive and say something constructive, lol.
Only bantering ya chum. Good post and thanks for sharing.
Are these types of Government guarantees available for UK based contracts then, and if so does anyone have any knowledge on these schemes or where we can read up on the types of guarantees available ?
Here's the link for the article i was talking about.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/trade-minister-announces-ukef-support-for-scottish-offshore-wind-exports
For the recently awarded 26M Saipem contract, Infrastrata were required to provide a 4M performance bond prior to the contract commencement. 4M of the capital raise in the last few weeks (with issuing the new shares) is to be used for this purpose.
With time on my hands today i decided to research a bit further into the various types of contract bonds that can apply in business. It was very interesting to read about the types of bonds, sureties and guarantees that can be required in contract negotiations and on researching these I stumbled across quite a dramatic positive headline from Friday past.
It's where the UK International Trade Minister Graham Stuart announced financial support with a performance bond for a Scottish company, FoundOcean, to provide grouting foundations for 100 wind turbines in Thailand. (These aren't jacket foundations that H & W are doing but the construction grouting material to secure the bases to the actual sea bed)
FoundOcean's CEO comments :-
'Offshore wind projects often require a performance bond – ensuring completion of the project – at up to 15% of the contract value before work is even commenced. This would have meant putting a significant deposit forward and, due to the scale of the Taiwan project, FoundOcean was unable to arrange this through its bank. UKEF stepped in with bond support that enabled FoundOcean to fulfil the contract'.
My point is that since 2019 UK Export Finance (UKEF) have provided 500M of export finance guarantees for offshore windfarms being built in Thailand and this is quite a sum of capital, bearing in mind it was supporting a total of only 30 jobs in FoundOcean. Could these guarantees be available to Infa ?
Does anyone here on the page have knowledge of Export Finance guarantees and can these apply to services (such as those that H & W provide) and not just product (like FoundOcean's turbines base grouting) ?
If H & W had access to UKEF guarantees, surely this would permit tendering on higher value contracts and would remove or reduce the need to come up with non working holding capital such as this 4M to secure the Saipem 26M contract.
It's good to see progress on the NnG Scottish windfarm.
Saipem awarded the 26M contract to Infrastrata for 8 foundation jackets with work due to commence at H & W on 1st July. From reading previously I believe Saipem are also paying monthly on this contract work. This will definitely help with the cash flow situation in the pursuit of the company starting to become profitable.
https://www.energyvoice.com/renewables-energy-transition/wind/uk-wind/328525/nng-shunt-reactor/
Fill yer boots boys. Here's some nite time reading on those gantry cranes . . . or big metal lifty things Si ;-)
https://www.mazzellacompanies.com/learning-center/gantry-cranes-different-types-design/
I don't know anything about it Drango whether it's new, reconditioned, etc.
Have a look at the Harland & Wolff Facebook page. They've a photo of it there with over 600 comments on it re the naming of it. Some of them are quite funny.
Stokey (11.58). Although from the photo the new crane is a fair size, it's still a tiddler compared to the Samson & Goliath cranes, so it wouldn't go close to replacing either of them.
My thoughts are that it could be for the BDD as it only currently has 2 Henson cranes servicing it, and not the gantry type cranes like Samson & Goliath on the BBD. (The new crane is a gantry type like S & G).
I'm encouraged to see this new gantry crane coming as it would have been quite an expensive article and you don't incur expenditure like that unless there's a very good reason. We just don't know what the reason (or contract) is yet.
Remember the new welding machine came into H & W Belfast recently too and the fanfare they made of that. That wasn't purchased for no reason either !
There's definitely something afoot and i believe we're going to find out very soon.
I'm now really laughing Si.
Thon 'Lil Yella lifty thing' would be ideal for lifting those big floaty boats or big wurley windmills.
Here's the link below (hopefully) with the photo of the new crane.
https://www.facebook.com/BelfastLiveOnline/photos/pb.526712010807134.-2207520000../2533588980119417/?type=3&theater
Lol Si.
You could suggest that name but i imagine you might get struggle to get someone to second it (other than maybe BP) .
( Soz Lisa, no offence intended, am just banterin for the craic here )