Offshore construction on Cooper’s Sole project finished

Installation and testing of the 67 km control umbilical connecting Cooper Energy’s Sole gas field offshore Australia with the Orbost Gas Plant has been completed.

The Cooper-operated Sole gas field is located in the eastern part of the Gippsland Basin, approximately 40km offshore Victoria, Australia.

This milestone marks completion of the offshore construction phase of the Sole Gas Project, Cooper said on Monday.

The only work remaining on the offshore project is repair of the damaged pipe section, which was discovered in November last year by Cooper’s subsea contractor, Subsea 7.

Namely, Subsea 7 reported to Cooper it had identified an anomaly in the form of a through wall thickness opening at one location in the pipeline during the performance of pipeline acceptance pressure testing (hydrotest). The repairs are expected to start in late April.

Cooper said that the offshore project, which was 93% complete at end-February, is expected to be fully completed, ready and available to deliver gas to APA Group’s Orbost Gas Plant by end-May 2019.

Work on the onshore element of the project to upgrade Orbost Gas Plant to process gas from Sole is well advanced. APA are currently assessing the most likely plant completion date within the September quarter and working closely with Cooper Energy to confirm timing and ensure a safe and reliable start-up for the plant.

Gas supply from Sole to the Orbost Gas Plant is expected to start prior to plant completion for the commissioning and the subsequent plant performance test.