Australia’s Barrow Island, off the country’s northwestern coast, is a pristine nature reserve and home to Chevron’s Gorgon Project, one of largest natural gas development ventures in the world. Chevron is building a large liquefied natural gas terminal on the island that will be producing 15 million tons of LNG per year when it opens in 2014. It will tap underwater gas basins as far as 120 miles off the continent.
Monster Deal: The Gorgon subsea gas fields sit in water that is 600 to 1,400 feet deep. GE technology will help Chevron move gas through an underwater pipeline network that measures hundreds of miles long.
Working in this challenging environment requires partners that can keep operations running while respecting the island reserve’s nature quarantine guidelines. GE is already supplying the energy giant with more than $1 billion in heavy duty mining and LNG equipment. This morning GE said that it won another $600 million contract to provide Chevron with “mission critical services” at Gorgon for the next 22 years. “The underlying mega-trends of the oil and gas industry play to our strengths,” says Dan Heintzelman, president and CEO of GE Oil & Gas.
GE is building five 2,300 ton power generation modules that will produce a combined 650 megawatts of electricity for the Barrow Island terminal. Each of the steel modules rises 90 feet and could easily cover half of a football field. GE workers applied six miles of structural welding to assemble the steel trusses that support each structure.
GE will also supply Chevron with heavy-duty gas turbines that will drive Gorgon’s refrigeration units that turn natural gas into liquid that can be pumped into LNG tankers and shipped overseas. GE subsea technology such as wellheads, pipeline termination systems and other equipment will help Chevron move gas through an underwater pipeline network that measures hundreds of miles long. It will also power Chevron’s unique CO2 sequestration system that will pipe carbon dioxide into empty gas wells.
Gorgon is Australia’s largest natural gas field and has enough gas to keep supplying the market for at least 40 years. Australia will surpass Qatar as the world’s largest LNG producer by 2018. GE Oil & Gas equipment is present on every major LNG project in Australia today, a sign of leadership in the sector.
