Stock Photo - 12 April 2022, Lower Saxony, Stade: Knut Kokkelink (l-r), Branch Manager of the port company Niedersachsen Ports, Holger Banik, Managing Director of Niedersachsen Ports, Olaf Lies (SPD) Environment Minister of Lower Saxony, Bernd Althusmann (CDU,r), Transport Minister of Lower Saxony, and Johann Killinger, Managing Partner of Hanseatic Energy Hub GmbH, hold a box containing the approval documents for the import terminal for liquefied natural gas. An import terminal for liquefied natural gas (LNG) is to be built in Stade by 2026. Up to 13.3 billion cubic meters of gas per year will then be piped from there into the networks - around 15 percent of Germany's gas demand. The operator consortium Hanseatic Energy Hub (HEH) submitted the approval documents to the responsible State Trade Supervisory Office in Lüneburg on Monday and expects to receive approval by March 2023. Construction work is then scheduled to begin. Photo: Sina Schuldt/dpa. - Stade/Lower Saxony/Germany