Japanese company Inpex Corp. expects to begin gas production from Ichthys field wellheads in the Browse basin offshore Western Australia as early as next week or the week after.
The company says it is now on track to dispatch the first shipments of condensate, LNG, and LPG by the end of September.
The announcement follows completion of the commissioning program for the project’s giant semisubmersible central processing facility (CPF) moored near the field. Inpex said the CPF commissioning marked the completion of the necessary commissioning of all key onshore and offshore facilities for production start-up.
Christened Ichthys Explorer, the CPF will remain moored in 250 m of water for the expected 40-year life of Ichthys field.
The 120,000-tonne platform was towed 5,600 km from the Samsung Heavy Industry’s Geoje shipyard in South Korea and manoeuvred into position in May 2017.
The vessel has topsides measuring 130 m by 120 m making it the world’s largest semisubmersible platform. It has accommodation for as many as 200 people.
The CPF is the central hub of the $37-billion Ichthys LNG project and will perform the initial offshore processing of all production from the field, delivered to it via a network comprising 130 km of subsea flowline infrastructure.
Processed gas will be sent through an 890-km subsea pipeline to the onshore LNG plant at Bladin Point near Darwin.
Most of the condensate and water from the CPF will be transferred to the 1 million-bbl capacity Ichthys Venture floating production, storage, and offloading vessel, which is permanently moored 3½ km away. Condensate will be sold directly to the international market via offtake tankers. The Ichthys Venture FPSO arrived on location last September.
Overall, the project will produce 8.9 million tonnes/year of LNG, along with 1.6 million tpy of LPG and 100,000 b/d of condensate.
Ichthys lies about 450 km north of Broome and 220 km off the Western Australian Kimberley coast.
Indications of the field were originally found in 1980 by Woodside Petroleum Ltd. with the Brewster 1A exploration well. But Woodside took it no further and in 1998, Inpex acquired the surrounding permit and began new exploration activities.
Three additional exploration wells were drilled in the field in 2000. Five appraisal wells were drilled between June 2003 and February 2004, with the field declared commercially viable in March 2009. A final investment decision on development was reached in January 2012.
Gas is contained in two reservoirs of the Brewster and Plover formation. Ichthys is estimated to contain 530 million bbl of condensate and 12.8 tcf of gas.
Inpex has 62.245% interest in and operatorship of the project. Total has 30%, CPC Corp. 2.625%, Tokyo Gas 1.575%, Osaka Gas 1.2%, Kansai Electric 1.2%, JERA 0.735%, and Toho Gas 0.42%.