Knutsen NYK Offshore Tankers AS (KNOT), a joint venture between Japanese shipping major NYK and Norway's TS Shipping Invest (TSSI), has concluded a first long-term time charter contract for a shuttle tanker with PetroChina International (America), part of PetroChina Company Limited.

As informed, the contract is for a period of up to ten years starting from 2022.

The contract aims to use a 154,000 dwt Suezmax tanker equipped with a dynamic-positioning system built in China by COSCO (Zhoushan) Shipyard Co. Ltd. to shuttle crude oil produced in waters off Brazil.

KNOT is a 50/50 JV between NYK and the parent company of the Knutsen Group. The KNOT Group has a share of about 40 per cent of the world shuttle tanker market — not including the number of vessels on order and shuttle tankers in Russia.

With the new contract, the JV will have 34 shuttle tankers in operation or on order.