Global business giant GE announced its plans to open an $80 million state-of -the-art technology and learning complex on a 100,00 square metre site at Jandakot Airport.
Global business giant GE announced its plans to open an $80 million state-of -the-art technology and learning complex on a 100,00 square metre site at Jandakot Airport.
GE's global Chairman and CEO, Jeff Immelt said the sizable investment will emphasise the importance of service technology and training for the future.
"The essential purpose of the complex will be to service customers like Chevron and other big projects in Australia. The thrust of the training and education will be around elevating skills to support not only GE workers, but our supply chains and our partners, to do high skill apprentice work," he said.
It will provide the skills and training to support growth in the oil and gas, energy, mining, transportation and water industries.
GE Head of Energy and Gas Mike Hosford said the investment builds on GE's presence in Western Australia, which includes the former Vetco Gray oil and gas services business it acquired several years ago.
"We've supplied every liquefaction LNG train that's in Australia so all of the trains 1 through 5 for the north west shelf for Woodside, we started 25 years ago for the first train so we have a long history of operating over here," he said.
Now trading as GE Oil and Gas, the group won major contracts on some of the state's largest projects, including the Gorgon gas development.
In 2009, it secured a $400 million contract to provide equipment to drive Gorgon's LNG production and the project's carbon dioxide sequestration scheme, which will be the world's largest.
In 2008, GE signed a five-year agreement to supply subsea equipment and support services to the Gorgon project.
GE said the Jandakot complex would be a 'community of technical best practice' for industry, offering 44,800 accredited training days to non-GE employees, with a further 2,000 training days for GE employees.
The complex will be the first to offer the full range of technical training required to meet the demands of the resource sector in Australia, and will be the first GE training facility globally to be accredited against the national qualification framework.
GE Australia and New Zealand President Steve Sargent said developing the right skills was essential to fuelling Australia's economic growth and ensuring that maximum value was created from projects like Gorgon.
"In WA we've seen tremendous growth over last few years with resources boom and with our oil and gas business. Working with the Australian Government to invest in a highly skilled labour force is going to create tremendous value for both the industries that are thriving here, and the local economy," he said.
The GE complex has been designed as a multi-purpose facility and headquarters for GE operations in Perth.
