Clough AMEC awarded Wheatstone Project ORM contract

Engineering and construction company Clough has announced that the Clough AMEC joint venture has been awarded a contract worth more than $30 million for the operability, reliability and maintainability component of the Chevron-operated Wheatstone project offshore facilities.

The win comes on top of two major Wheatstone contracts awarded to Clough and another joint venture in February, collectively worth $750 million.

On February 12, Clough and its joint venture partner BAM International have won a $400 million engineering and construction contract on Chevron's Wheatstone liquefied natural gas (LNG) project. The BAM Clough joint venture was awarded the contract by Bechtel, the lead engineering contractor on the LNG project.

Three days earlier Clough was awarded a $350 million contract in its own right early this month for the hook-up and commissioning of the offshore components of the Wheatstone LNG project.

Outside of Wheatstone, Clough has also been in the contract action. Earlier this month the Clough AMEC joint venture was  awarded a contract for the provision of maintenance support to the 1.3 billion cubic metre per year onshore gas treatment plant and the offshore unmanned wellhead platform for Eni’s Blacktip Project, supplying gas to the Northern Territory.

In late March, the BAM Clough joint venture executed two binding contracts collectively worth $510 million with the JKC JV, a joint venture between JGC Corporation, KBR and Chiyoda Corporation,  for the design and construction of the Ichthys LNG project module offloading facility and the Ichthys product loading jetty.

Work on the latest Wheatstone contract win will be performed by Clough AMEC, with support from its specialist Performance Improvement division. The scope of work involves building the maintenance database, assuring operational readiness for the offshore facilities, all training and development programmes, operations engineering and support services. 

Work will commence immediately and will last approximately 3.5 years.

At peak the project will employ over 50 people based in Perth.

Clough’s CEO Kevin Gallagher said this was an important win for Clough AMEC.

“As the project moves from the construction to operations phase, this is a strategically important contract which represents further growth in our Commissioning and Asset Support business, which was awarded the Wheatstone Hook-up and Commissioning contract earlier in the year,” Mr Gallagher said in a statement.

“We will work with our long term strategic partner AMEC to assure operational readiness for this important Australian project and our valued client Chevron.

AMEC regional director Australia and South East Asia Steve Ciccone said this contract award reinforces the collaborative strength of Clough AMEC, particularly in performance improvement.

The offshore Wheatstone Project Processing Platform will be one of Australia's largest offshore facilities with a topsides weight of about 37,000 tonnes. The topsides will be transported to the offshore installation site on a barge, and installed onto the substructure using a float over procedure.

The platform topsides have a total deck area of 20,000 square metres and include primary processing equipment, as well as support utility systems and personnel facilities.