The owner of the Dampier to Bunbury natural gas pipeline says it has saved $55 million on current expansion works, which will start operating early next month.
The owner of the Dampier to Bunbury natural gas pipeline says it has saved $55 million on current expansion works, which will start operating early next month.
The group of owners, including DUET and Babcock & Brown Infrastructure, said the final contracted cost for stage 5A of the project came in at $605 million, less than the budgeted $660 million.
The stage 5A expansion results in a 15 per cent increase in firm full-haul capacity along the pipeline.
Expansion work for stage 5B of the pipeline is expected to start early year, with the owners confident that it can achieve cost savings against the budgeted $690 million.
In June, DBP received the all necessary financing and equity commitments for Stage 5B of the project, which involves duplicating several sections of the pipeline. The duplication process, known as looping, started with stages 4 and 5A expansion projects.
In Stage 5B, the combined length of the new loops will be some 440km.
The announcement is pasted below:
The Dampier Bunbury Pipeline Group of companies (DBP) is pleased to announce that on Monday 1 December 2008, the last contracted capacity for the Stage 5A Expansion Project will be made available to shippers under the Standard Shipper Contracts. DBP previously announced the commissioning of this project on time and well within budget.
The final contracted cost of the DBNGP Stage 5A expansion has now been confirmed at $605m compared with the original budget of $660m. A bank requirement for an additional $33m equity contingency allocation was removed some months ago and transferred to the DBNGP Stage 5B Expansion Project, with construction of that project expected to commence in January 2009.
Following the awarding of a number of major contracts for Stage 5B, DBP is confident that cost savings will be achieved against the $690m Stage 5B budget.
DBP Executive Chairman, Stuart Hohnen said "This is an exceptional outcome and once again demonstrates the ability of DBP's management team and asset manager Westnet Energy, to deliver large complex pipeline expansions on-time and under budget."
The benefits that the Stage 5A expansion brings to the state of Western Australia are immediate with approximately an additional 100TJ/ day of firm full-haul capacity which has been progressively available since March this year. The Stage 5A expansion results in a 15% increase in firm full-haul capacity along the DBNGP.
"By increasing the duplication of the DBNGP to approximately 50% of its total length, the Stage 5A expansion further strengthens the security of supply of gas to Western Australia's South-West region and secures the energy supply to support ongoing growth for the State.
"The Stage 5B Expansion will add further security by increased duplication of the pipeline - to approximately 92% of the distance to Perth - by early 2010," Mr Hohnen said.
