Gorgon Ramping Up
Monday 1 May 2017
US supermajor Chevron is turning its attention to ramping up the Gorgon liquefied natural gas project to nameplate capacity before looking at optimisation and debottlenecking of the Australian gas project.
The president of Chevron Asia Pacific Exploration & Production, Stephen W Green, confirmed during an earnings call with analysts that all three trains at the project were operating at over 85% of their aggregate 15.6 million tonne per annum nameplate capacity.
Chevron will now look to complete the commissioning and startup of additional equipment which will boost the efficiency of the trains – such as turbo expanders and end flash gas compressors.
“Once all systems are in operation, we can begin the optimisation and tuning of each train, the first step in further increasing capacity,” Green said.
“After this, we'll analyse plant performance and look for debottlenecking opportunities that'll increase capacity and capture incremental value going forward.”
Green later confirmed that all three trains had individually been run at or near nameplate capacity but were yet to be run simultaneously at full capacity.
“There's nothing that is prohibiting us from operating at nameplate capacity except the fact that we have to work through a methodical startup and again bring on the proper blend from gas from Jansz and Gorgon,” he said.
“I referenced there's some additional equipment that we will now commission since all three trains are operating that will allow us to, again, boost capacity and continue working toward nameplate capacity.”
Green also shed some more light on the recent shutdown of Train 2 in late March which saw the operator carry out maintenance work.
Green explained the planned shutdown was to address a mechanical device which was part of the flow measurement apparatus which the company had previously dealt with at Train 1, which has experienced several shutdowns since commencing production last year.
He added that the issue had been addressed at Train 3 prior to it commencing production in March this year.
Green said Gorgon was currently loading a cargo roughly every two days with the project shipping a total of 67 cargoes as of Friday, with 38 of those shipped since the start of the year.
The Gorgon LNG project lies on Barrow Island and is fed by the Gorgon and Jansz-Io gas fields, which lie about 65 and 130 kilometres off the West Australian coast, respectively.
It also includes a domestic gas plant with the capacity to supply 300 terajoules of gas per day to Western Australia.