Name and Location
Gladstone liquefied natural gas (GLNG) project, Queensland, Australia.

Client
The GLNG project is a joint venture between the operator, Santos (30%), Petronas (27,5%), Total (27,5%) and Korea Gas Corporation (Kogas) (15%).

Project Description
The Santos GLNG project is a pioneering venture to convert coal seam gas (CSG) to liquefied natural gas (LNG) for export to global markets.

It includes the development of CSG resources in the Bowen and Surat basins, in south-east Queensland, the construction of a 420 km underground gas transmission pipeline to Gladstone, and two LNG trains, with a combined nameplate capacity of 7.8-million tonnes a year on Curtis Island.

Value
$18.5-billion.

Duration
The first LNG will be delivered in 2015 and plateau production of the LNG plant is expected to be reached in 2016 and be maintained for more than 20 years.

Latest Developments
Workers are preparing to install key pieces of machinery and infrastructure at the GLNG project.

The Fairview site, near Roma, will soon feature ten nodal compressors, each taller than a two-storey-house, and three hub compressor units, each the height of a five-storey building.

Most of the major machinery at the site, which is the size of 100 football fields, will have been installed by July.

Once the hubs are constructed, gas from wells will be pressurised or ‘compressed’ at these sites before being sent along the project’s 420 km pipeline to Curtis Island.

The gas extracted from the wells will go through several compression stages, starting at the nodal compressor stations and finishing at the main hub compressor units.

The nodal compressors will increase gas pressure more than fivefold before gas is sent to the main hub compressor units.

Meanwhile, Santos GLNG’s 277 t tunnel-boring machine (TBM), which will connect the project’s mainland infrastructure with its LNG facility on Curtis Island, was launched on April 16.

The 100-metre-long TBM has drilled through 38 m of rock and soil under Gladstone harbour since it first left its launch shaft.

Further, a 2 000-person-strong workforce is assembling and installing two LNG tanks that will be as tall as 16-storey buildings when finished.

Parts are also being assembled for two LNG trains, designed to convert gas to liquid before it is shipped.

Three molecular sieve dehydrators from South Korea were erected in Train 1 in April, with each column weighing more than that of a freight-train engine. The columns will extract excess moisture from gas entering the trains.

The construction of a 360-m-long jetty, along which LNG will be pumped from storage tanks to the ship loading platform, is about halfway.

A 200-t cantilevered device, known as a jetty traveller, is driving steel piles into the seabed floor to anchor the jetty.

Key Contracts and Suppliers
Fluor Corporation (engineering procurement and construction (EPC) services for upstream facilities); Saipem (construction of the gas transmission pipeline); Bechtel (construction of the LNG plant).

On Budget and on Time?
Not stated.

Contact Details for Project Information
Santos GLNG project tel +61 07 3838 3000, fax +61 7 3862 3722 or email info@glng.com.au.