Russia Doubles Dark Fleet to Ship LNG to Asia
In just nine months, Russia has doubled the number of opaque-owned vessels that it uses to ship liquefied natural gas from its sanctioned Arctic LNG 2 export project, a Bloomberg analysis of vessel-tracking data showed on Tuesday. As of December 2025, Russia was estimated to have 11 LNG carriers in
Source: OilPrice.com
―
DW NOTE
Russia has doubled its shadow tanker fleet for LNG shipments to Asia — not because demand surged, but because the Strait of Hormuz has been closed since late February. When you can't route through the Gulf, you need twice as many hulls to cover the longer trip around Africa. This isn't fleet expansion, it's forced inefficiency priced into every molecule of gas that reaches Shanghai.