LNG engineer Bechtel informed it is on track to complete the construction of an additional three liquefied natural gas production trains on Curtis Island by the end of 2015, quadrupling Queensland’s production of the chilled gas.
Bechtel is constructing the state’s first three LNG plants, the first in the world to convert commercial quantities of coal seam gas into liquid form ready for export.
When complete, the operators of the plants – Queensland Curtis LNG (BG Group), GLNG (Santos, Petronas, Total & Kogas) and Australia Pacific LNG (ConocoPhillips) – will produce the commodity for export to their global customers.
“The projects will begin producing LNG in rapid succession over the second half of 2015,” said Alasdair Cathcart, Bechtel’s global LNG general manager .
Six production trains will be operational when Bechtel hands over the LNG plants to the owner teams for long-term operation. Queensland Curtis LNG Train 1 has been producing LNG since December 2014, filling more than 16 ships with cargo to date.
Bechtel is currently working on delivering the second train for that project. Concurrently, Bechtel teams on the GLNG and Australia Pacific LNG plants recently introduced gas into their systems and began producing their own power as part of commissioning the first of two production trains on each site. The second production trains on each of these projects are expected to be operational in early 2016, Bechtel said in a statement on Monday.
At full capacity, the three Curtis Island projects combined will produce about 25 million tonnes of LNG per annum for the global market, the equivalent to powering a city the size of Tokyo with 13 million people.
Bechtel is also the principal downstream contractor for the Chevron-operated Wheatstone project in Western Australia and is partnered with customers to build more than a third of the world’s LNG liquefaction capacity currently under construction, the company added.
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Image: Bechtel