Australia’s Woodside and its partners in the Pluto and NWS LNG export projects have signed non-binding deals with Western Gas to liquefy gas from the Equus project at the two LNG plants.
The partners would now work on finalizing fully termed agreements for the processing of 2-3 Mtpa of Equus gas from 2027 utilizing Woodside-operated infrastructure, according to a statement by Woodside issued on Tuesday.
Western Gas owns 100 percent of the 2 Tcf Equus gas project.
Under the deal, a floating production storage and offloading facility would produce Equus gas for transport through a 200 kilometers long pipeline to the Pluto LNG facility.
Woodside said that prior to capacity being available in Pluto Train 1 the Equus gas would be transported via the Pluto-KGP Interconnector for processing and export at the Karratha gas plant, part of NWS, with processing and export via Pluto Train 1 to start once processing capacity becomes available.
First LNG in 2027
The partners target first LNG in 2027, with a target aggregate production of 2-3 Mtpa of LNG and 50-75 TJ/d of domestic gas.
Woodside operates both the NWS and Pluto LNG facilities. Its partners in NWS include BP, Chevron, Japan Australia LNG, and Shell while the Pluto LNG participants include Kansai Electric Power and Tokyo Gas.
Woodside CEO Meg O’Neill said in the statement that by leveraging existing infrastructure, Woodside would enable Western Gas to access a competitive option to supply Asian LNG markets while providing additional domestic gas security for Western Australia.
“This is an important step in maximizing utilization of our existing infrastructure to deliver domestic gas and LNG to local and global customers and value for our shareholders and community,” she said.
“The proposed gas processing opportunity with Western Gas for the Equus offshore resource demonstrates the flexibility provided by the Pluto-KGP Interconnector, which commenced operations in March 2022, to optimize available capacity at our world-class facilities,” O’Neill said.
