DEME and Van Oord join pipeline duplication project off Australia

A joint venture of Van Oord and DEME has won a contract from Allseas for the Darwin Pipeline Duplication Project located offshore Northern Australia.

Van Oord and DEME will be responsible for providing support for the shallow water pipeline installation scope in Northern Territory waters, including trenching, pipe pull operations and rock placement work.

The companies will carry out trenching, pipe pull operations and prepare the shore crossing at the landfall location near the Santos-operated Darwin LNG plant.

Additionally, rock placement works will be performed to protect the pipeline.

A cutter suction dredger, trailing suction hopper dredger and backhoe dredger will be deployed for the project, as well as a fallpipe vessel for the rock placement and a linear pulling winch for the pipe pull.

Project preparations are set to start immediately.

“DEME is delighted to be returning to Australia. We already have extensive experience through important projects like Wheatstone and Gladstone,” said Hugo Bouvy, managing director of DEME Offshore.

“Here, we also successfully worked together with Van Oord. Our expert team has in-depth knowledge of the local safety culture and stringent environmental standards Australia has in place. DEME and Van Oord both have large fleets of modern equipment which enables us to choose the most suitable vessels, and to give our client Allseas a flexible and efficient solution.” 

Santos, as the operator of the Barossa joint venture, announced at the end of August that a final investment decision (FID) had been taken to proceed with the Darwin Pipeline Duplication Project.

The decision will extend the Barossa Gas Export Pipeline to the Darwin LNG facility and allow for the repurposing of the existing Bayu-Undan to Darwin pipeline to facilitate carbon capture and storage (CCS) options.

Work on the project is scheduled to begin next year, subject to Commonwealth and NT regulatory approvals.

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