ESL Shipping Oy

The third cargo of an Iranian tanker flotilla carrying fuel for gasoline-thirsty Venezuela was approaching the nation's exclusive economic zone on Tuesday as the previous two were preparing to discharge, according to Refinitiv Eikon data.The Iran-flagged tanker Petunia entered the Caribbean Sea on Monday after crossing the Atlantic Ocean, following the route taken in recent days by vessels Fortune and Forest.The Fortune was welcomed at state-run PDVSA's El Palito refinery by Venezuela's oil minister, Tareck El Aissami, who thanked Iran for its support during the crisis, which has forced Venezuelans to wait in long lines for gasoline.

The coronavirus pandemic has not caused Italian shipbuilding giant Fincantieri to lose any of its existing orders, CEO Giuseppe Bono told a Senate defense committee.While the company has not received any order cancellations to date, the company—one of the world's top cruise ship builders—said in its first quarter report that it is in talks with clients and subcontractors to discuss potentially stretching out order delivery times for vessels currently under construction and on order.Fincantieri is also reportedly planning to boost naval vessel orders to help offset any delayed deliveries for cruise ship customers hard hit by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ship assessors are resorting to virtual inspections of oil tankers to keep vessels afloat, as the coronavirus pandemic makes physical visits to check for seaworthiness tougher and a slump in fuel demand increases the need for ships as storage.Oil tankers require rigorous inspections twice a year to reduce the risk of oil spills or mechanical collapse with polluting cargoes onboard.But the global pandemic has disrupted international trade, leaving merchant seafarers stuck on ships for weeks because of limits on air travel and bans on the movement of people even as some countries start easing restrictions.

The European Union's carbon market could capture a large chunk of emissions from outside Europe if the bloc succeeds in including shipping in the scheme, according to the European Commission's first report on maritime CO2 emissions.Pollution from ships plying international waters typically escapes countries' domestic emissions-cutting targets, but the EU's executive has said the sector must contribute to its trillion-euro push to achieve a "climate neutral" economy by 2050.It wants to curb shipping's carbon footprint by adding it to the Europe-wide emissions trading system (ETS), which forces emitters to buy carbon permits when they pollute.

U.S. liquefied natural gas exports are down by more than a third since governments started imposing lockdowns to stop the spread of the coronavirus.Worldwide gas prices have plunged as lockdowns squeezed energy demand even as strong renewables output boosted supply. Gas prices are more expensive now in the United States than in Europe for the first time in a decade.Buyers in Asia and Europe have already canceled over 20 U.S. LNG cargoes for June and July, and more cancellations are anticipated.Gas flows to U.S. LNG export plants fell from a record 9.5 billion cubic feet per day in late March to a six-month low of 5.6 bcfd this week, according to Refinitiv.