NOPSEMA opens Shell’s Crux development for comment

The Hague-based LNG giant Shell’s proposal to develop the Crux gas field approximately 160 kilometers north-east of the Prelude field in the northern Browse Basin, offshore Western Australia, has been open for comment.

National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA) on Monday said the project is open for comment for a six-week period ending March 18, 2019.

Shell, together with joint venture partners Seven Group Holdings Energy and Osaka Gas, has identified Crux project as the primary source of backfill gas supply to the Prelude FLNG facility.

The proposed Crux project consists of a not normally manned (NNM) platform in water depths of approximately 165 meters of water with five production wells, minimal processing and utility systems, tied back to the existing Prelude FLNG facility via a 165-kilometer export pipeline. Crux will be operated remotely from the Prelude FLNG facility.

Front-end engineering and design for the project is expected to commence in 2019 with the financial investment decision (FID) currently scheduled to occur in 2020. The project is anticipated to have a 20-year design life, with potential for extension.

In the project development filing, Shell notes that there is also a potential for subsea developments that will provide hydrocarbons to the Crux platform. These developments are expected to comprise subsea production wells, completed with subsea trees, and associated subsea tie-back to the platform.

From FID it will take approximately four to five years for the platform to be fully designed, constructed off-site and towed to the location.

Whilst the platform is being built, the subsea production wells would be drilled and suspended until the installation of the platform facilities, after which the wells would be completed, hooked-up to the platform and brought online.