Page 11 - AsianOil Week 34 2022

AsianOil SOUTHEAST ASIA AsianOil

Harbour downplays Indonesian find

PROJECTS & UK-LISTED Harbour Energy has sought to implications not only for Harbour but also the
COMPANIES temper expectations about its Timpan gas dis- Indonesian government, which is targeting a
covery in the deepwater North Sumatra basin ramp-up in national gas production to 124bn
The company has off Indonesia, noting in its financial results last cubic metres per year by the end of the decade.
said that permeability week that the permeability was on the low side This target can only be met with the development
is on the low side of of expectations. of new discoveries, rather than only existing,
expectations, meaning The Timpan-1 exploration well had been undeveloped fields.
reservoir quality is not hailed as a potential play-opener, but Harbour IHS Markit considers it most likely that Tim-
as good as was hoped. CEO Linda Cook warned during the release of pan will be used to supply the domestic market, via
the company’s financial results that “reservoir a tie-in to existing onshore facilities and pipelines,
quality at that location is not as good as we hoped potentially displacing LNG imports. Specifically, it
it might be." Harbour has said before that a lot of would be exported through the Arun-Belawan gas
work is needed to analyse the extensive data that pipeline to Medan, and could encourage increased
had been collected at the site, but that a lot of gas demand for gas from local industry and the power
was found. The hope is that the work will also generation sector. The development of the Dumai-
de-risk other multi-trillion cubic feet prospects Sei Mangkei pipeline would also enable Timpan’s
in the area. gas to flow further to markets in the central and
The Timpan-1 exploration well was completed southern parts of Sumatra.
in July some 150 km off the coast of Indonesia, in Alternatively, Timpan could be used for LNG
waters 1,294 metres deep, to a subsea depth of 4,211 exports. This would require the Arun LNG ter-
metres using the West Capella drillship at Harbour’s minal being converted back from a regasification
Andaman II production-sharing contract (PSC). to a liquefaction terminal, or the construction of
The well flowed 765,000 cubic metres per day of gas, a new liquefaction plant.
and 1,884 barrels per day (bpd) of condensate with Looking ahead, Spain’s Repsol and the UAE’s
58 degrees API. Mubadala Petroleum are planning additional
Timpan’s commerciality will have important wells in adjacent blocks in the frontier zone. ™

OCEANIA

Prelude FLNG strike ends after

wage deal reached

POLICY SHELL and unions representing workers at the a statement. The unions had been seeking not
Prelude floating LNG (FLNG) plant have struck only wage increases but also greater job security
The strike has been a deal on wage increases to bring an end to a and this had become a point of contention in
ongoing since June. long-running strike and relaunch production, negotiations.
they announced last week. Full details of the agreement will be released
The 3.6mn tonne per year (tpy) Prelude imminently. Unions are set to ratify the agree-
FLNG was closed down in July and Shell noti- ment in the coming days, and should they fail
fied its customers that it would be unable to sup- to do so, there is a risk that the strike might be
ply LNG while the industrial action continued. resumed.
The strike had begun sooner in June, but initially Hailing its victory, the unions said that the
was confined to one-hour work stoppages at the agreement sent a signal to other employers in
facility off the coast of Western Australia. Australia's energy industry, noting that there
“Shell is pleased to confirm an in-principle were upcoming contract negotiations with
enterprise agreement has been reached with the Chevron, Santos and Woodside that they hoped
Australian Workers’ Union and Electrical Trades would not result in similar industrial action.
Union in relation to the Prelude FLNG facility,” The resumption in Prelude FLNG's opera-
the company said in a statement. tions is good news for LNG customers particu-
The deal between the Offshore Alliance larly in Asia, as it should help ease soaring gas
that represented the two unions was mediated prices. The plant was closed in December last
by Australia’s Fair Work Commission, which year after a fire and power outage, and remained
approved the industrial action. shut until April. The Asian gas market is also
“Our members have not taken a backward contending with the risk of disruption in exports
step in fighting for job security, significant from the Sakhalin LNG plant in Russia, after a
uplifts in salaries and union-negotiated employ- Russian entity set up to manage the project has
ment conditions,” the Offshore Alliance said in asked customers to agree to new supply terms. ™

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