Inpex to miss Ichthys startup target

Japan’s Inpex has completed the commissioning of key facilities for the Ichthys LNG Project in Australia. However, the production will not start by the end of March as previously expected.

Inpex informed on Monday that the necessary commissioning of its operated Ichthys LNG Project’s first train (natural gas liquefaction facility) at the onshore gas liquefaction plant, floating production storage and offloading (FPSO) facility Ichthys Venturer and subsea production systems had been completed in view of readiness for production startup.

The project has already completed drilling the production wells required for the startup of production, and the approximately 890 kilometer-long gas export pipeline is also complete. Between April and May this year, the project will complete commissioning required for production startup at the central processing facility (CPF) Ichthys Explorer and start production of gas.

Thereafter, the project will begin the production and shipment of condensate, liquefied natural gas (LNG) and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) in sequence, Inpex said on Monday.

The subsea production system will collect the product extracted from production wells in the production manifold, and from there send the product to the CPF via flowlines and flexible risers. The CPF will process the product received via the flexible risers from the production wells, separating it into gas and condensate. The FPSO will receive condensate from the CPF, which it will store and offload onto tankers for shipping and export. The onshore gas liquefaction plant will extract condensate and LPG from the natural gas delivered by the pipeline, and cool and liquefy the remaining natural gas.

The Japanese company added that the project’s activity schedule going forward may fluctuate depending on weather conditions at the worksites, preparation activities, and other factors.

The impact of this development on the profit outlook in the company’s forecasted consolidated financial results for the year ending March 2018 is nil.