South Korea's Pan Ocean taps local yard for VLCC pair

South Korean shipping company Pan Ocean has awarded local shipbuilder HD Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) a contract for the construction of two very large crude carriers (VLCCs) in a series.

The VLCCs will be built at HHI's Ulsan facilities and are scheduled to be delivered to Pan Ocean by the third quarter of 2027 in fulfilment of the US$255 million order.

Each ship will have an LOA of 328 metres, a beam of 60 metres, a deadweight of 300,000, and a propulsion system that can be configured to allow operation on LNG and ammonia fuel in the future.

The propulsion's baseline configuration has been designed to comply with both IMO Tier III NOx emissions requirements and EEDI phase III standards thanks to the inclusion of a selective catalytic reduction system.

This contract with HHI marks Pan Ocean's first order for new 300,000DWT VLCCs since 2020, when it selected Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering (now Hanwha Ocean) for the construction of two ships valued at around US$90 million each.