ConocoPhillips has awarded three engineering contracts for front-end engineering and design work for the Barossa gas-condensate development project in the eastern Timor Sea about 300 km north of Darwin.
ConocoPhillips has introduced competition into the process for this, the first stage of the Barossa-Caldita proposal that gained approval from the Australian offshore regulator NOPSEMA in March.
Japan’s Mitsui Ocean Development & Engineering Co. was let a contract to help design the floating production, storage, and offloading vessel, while the UK’s TechnipFMC and South Korea’s Samsung Heavy Industries were let design contracts for the same vessel.
The vessel will produce from six subsea wells.
ConocoPhillips said it will choose the FPSO design from these two after it has made a final investment decision for the project at yearend 2019.
The third contract was let to INTECSEA, a subsidiary of WorleyParsons, to design subsea infrastructure and a new 260-290km undersea pipeline to run from Barossa field to the existing ConocoPhillips-operated Bayu Undan-Darwin pipeline.
ConocoPhillips did not disclose the value of the contracts.
The Barossa-Caldita project is expected to produce 3.7 million tonnes/year of LNG through the Darwin LNG plant, along with 1.5 million bbl/year of condensate when it comes on stream.
ConocoPhillips has 37.5% interest and operatorship of the Barossa-Caldita development. Other interest holders are SK Group, also with 37.5%, and Santos Ltd., Adelaide, 25%.
ConocoPhillips also operates the Darwin LNG plant for co-venturers Santos, Inpex, Eni SPA, Tokyo Gas, and JERA.