Golar is now focused on FLNGs and plans to more than double its operating FLNG capacity by 2030.
Besides the core FLNG business, Golar owns Macaw which is a small-scale LNG player with a land-based solution for capturing and monetization of flare gas, and it also has a 23.5 percent stake in shipowner Avenir LNG.
Golar’s CEO Karl Staubo said in May that Macaw has successfully developed the pilot LNG production unit named F2X and that it will soon deploy it in Texas.
One F2X unit is able to produce about 700 MMbtu of LNG and about 500 MMbtu of NGLs per day.
Staubo said during Golar’s second-quarter results call on August 15 that Macaw has now deployed the first F2X at the live well in Texas.
“We are currently working on tuning the operations to facilitate for fluctuation in the gas composition from flare gas, which is obviously different to a stable gas quality stream from a pipeline quality gas,” he said.
“As previously announced, we will consider strategic alternatives for the Macaw growth phase once the unit has proven stable operations on live well production,” Staubo said.
“Multiple clients”
According to Golar’s presentation, Macaw signed joint development agreements with “multiple clients” across the US, Mexico, Ecuador, and Colombia.
The company is also in talks with customers in Brazil and Peru.
“Macaw, the way we see it is a replication of what we are doing in the maritime environment at a smaller scale onshore,” Staubo said during the call.
“But the whole trick is that you capture flare gas that would otherwise be burned into the atmosphere. So i.e., the cost is extremely low of the input, and there is significant environmental benefit of if you managed to crack this solution,” he said.
“So on Macaw, what we’re trying to do is to leverage on the technological capabilities of the Golar organization to capture the same market opportunity that we do at large scale in the maritime environment at smaller scale onshore,” Staubo said.
“However, there should be no confusion that Golar’s focus is to grow on FLNG, and that is our focus, and we are not planning to divert any significant capital elsewhere,” he said.
