Woodside moves on Nth Rankin B

Amidst all of the political controversy over the state government’s planned gas reservation policy, Woodside Petroleum has progressed its planning for another multi-billion dollar gas project.

Woodside has sent a letter of intent to engineering companies WorleyParsons and Kellogg, Brown & Root to proceed with design work for the North Rankin B project, which is expected to cost in excess of $2 billion.

North Rankin B involves the installation of a second offshore platform alongside the existing North Rankin A platform, which has been producing since 1984.

The addition of this gas project is part of the gradual expansion of the North West Shelf venture, which is operated by Woodside.

The joint venture is currently investing $2.4 billion into expanding its LNG production plant on the Burrup Peninsula, $700 million on its Perseus-over-Goodwyn project and $1.6 billion on its Angel gas field development.

It is also evaluating the development of its Browse Basin gas fields offshore from Broome, at a likely cost of more than $10 billion.

Separately, Woodside is planning to develop its wholly-owned Pluto LNG project at an estimated cost of more than $5 billion.

WorleyParsons managing director Peter Meurs said the Eos joint venture (owned by WP and KBR) had just completed detailed design work for the Angel project, and had recently received a letter of intent for the front-end engineering and design work for North Rankin B.

“That’s a gas compression platform and it’s designed to unlock the low pressure gas around North Rankin,” he said.

Mr Meurs said the proposed platform would be of a similar size to the existing Goodwyn platform.

He recalled that plans for North Rankin B were first drawn up 20 years ago.

“When I joined the old Worley in 1988, North Rankin B was on the books.

“Worley designed North Rankin A and North Rankin B was mentioned in all the dispatches in the filing cabinets, but it’s taken this long to actually get here.”

Woodside is planning to make a final decision to proceed with North Rankin B next year, with first production scheduled for 2011.