Bahrain is going to award the contract for a planned floating liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in November this year according to Bahrain’s Energy Minister Abdulhussain Mirza.

Speaking to the domestic English-language newspaper Gulf Daily News, Mirza said that the estimated $400m terminal will be constructed near Khalifa Bin Salman Port and is expected to be operational and able to receive deliveries of LNG by ships by the first quarter of 2018.

Mirza told MEED earlier in 2015 that the winning bid for the contract would be announced before the end of the year.

Bahrain is currently struggling with a shortage of gas that has weighed on the country’s plans for industrial expansion.

It is hoped that the LNG terminal will ease the country’s gas shortage until projects to increase domestic production of gas over the long term are completed.

The facility will be fixed, but will have floating storage. The capacity is expected to be 400 million cubic feet a day (cf/d). The successful bidder will sign a build-own-operate-transfer (BOOT) agreement for an operational period of 20 years.

The scope of work includes the construction of floating gas storage, a ship-unloading system, LNG storage tanks, a regasification and send-out system, marine works, a jetty and other associated works.

Bahrain has been planning a LNG terminal for several years, but the plans stalled after the 2011 protests.