(New: further details on the origin of the liquefied natural gas, 2nd paragraph)

WILHELMSHAVEN (dpa-AFX) - A tanker with a full cargo of liquefied natural gas arrived in Wilhelmshaven on Tuesday for the first time since the LNG terminal opened. This was announced by the operator Uniper in the morning. The tanker "Maria Energy" was escorted to the terminal by police vessels for the last few meters.

According to Uniper, the "Maria Energy" is loaded with approximately 170,000 cubic meters of liquefied natural gas (LNG). That is enough to supply around 50,000 German households with energy for a year. According to the report, the ship was loaded with the LNG on December 19 in Cameron in the U.S. state of Louisiana.

The first German terminal for the import of liquefied natural gas (LNG) in Wilhelmshaven was opened in mid-December after a planning and construction period of almost ten months. Test operations began a few days later. The floating terminal off the North Sea coast of Lower Saxony is intended to help close the gap in Germany's gas supply caused by a lack of supplies from Russia.

The centerpiece of the terminal is the almost 300-meter-long special ship "Höegh Esperanza," which is to convert the liquefied natural gas delivered by tankers into its gaseous state and feed it into the German gas network. It can process up to five billion cubic meters of natural gas in gaseous form. When it arrived in December, the specialized vessel also already had a cargo of LNG on board and fed into the German grid. The ship, which arrived in Wilhelmshaven on Tuesday, is the first pure tanker, according to Uniper.

Until around mid-February, the feed-in of liquefied natural gas in Wilhelmshaven is still officially running in test mode. So closer attention is being paid to whether everything is working as planned, said a Uniper spokesman. He added that this would have no effect on the general work processes. The next tanker is expected in Wilhelmshaven in about a week.

In addition to Wilhelmshaven, LNG terminals are to be opened in Stade, Lubmin (Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania) and Brunsbüttel (Schleswig-Holstein) in the coming months.

Environmentalists wanted to protest the arrival of the LNG tanker in the evening. They fear damage to the Wadden Sea as a result of the terminal operation. They also criticize that the gas on board the ship, which comes from the United States, was extracted using the controversial fracking method. "That Germany today for the first time directly obtains fracked gas from the USA is no reason for joy, but a historic low blow for climate protection and nature conservation," Deutsche Umwelthilfe announced.

Fracking involves extracting gas or oil from rock strata using pressure and fluids, which can pose risks to the environment. This is prohibited in Germany./xma/DP/ngu