US supermajor Chevron has restarted full production from its Wheatstone liquefied natural gas project in Australia following a trip last week that affected one of the two liquefaction trains at the 8.9 million tonnes per annum facility.
“Chevron Australia confirms full production resumed last night (17 September) at the Wheatstone gas facility following a fault on 14 September,” a Chevron spokesperson told Upstream.
“During this time LNG continued to be produced at approximately 80% of usual rates, and vessel loading continued.”
The spokesperson added that there was no change to scheduled LNG deliveries from the Wheatstone, while the project’s domestic gas facilities and supply were unaffected.
Upstream understands that the fault that caused last week’s trip was an instrumentation issue. Trips at LNG projects around the globe are not uncommon and, when production is not majorly impacted and scheduled deliveries are not missed, rarely make headlines. However, the incident at Wheatstone was in the spotlight because of the ongoing industrial action at Chevron’s liquefaction projects in Australia.
Chevron has asked Australia’s Fair Work Commission to help mediate with unions after unionised workers at its 15.6 million tpa Gorgon and Wheatstone LNG last week stepped up their industrial action after being unable to agree on pay and conditions.
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