Chevron Australia has begun production from Train 1 of its $34-billion Wheatstone LNG project in northwest Western Australia with the first cargo scheduled to be shipped in the coming weeks.
Train 2 is expected to be brought on stream in 6-8 months, which will take the project up to its full capacity of 8.9 million tonnes/year of LNG.
In a deal signed with Alinta Energy in 2016, Chevron also will supply 200 terajoules/day of gas from the Wheatstone plant into the Western Australian grid. The 7-year agreement is for the delivery of 20 petajoules/year of gas starting in 2020.
The project was originally scheduled to come on stream at yearend 2016, but suffered a number of construction delays and cost increases.
Gas from offshore Wheatstone and Iago fields is piped to the onshore production facilities about 12 km west of Onslow on the Western Australia coast.
During construction phase the project created in excess of 7,000 jobs and more than $20 billion (Aus.) was spent on local goods and services through 300 different Australian companies.
Chevron is operator with 64.14% of the project. Other partners include Kuwait Foreign Petroleum Exploration Co. 13.4%, Woodside Petroleum Ltd. 13%, Kyushu Electric Power Co. 1.46%, and PE Wheatstone Pty. Ltd. 8%.
