Australian Origin Energy’s Production Up as APLNG Runs at Full Tilt
Australian Origin Energy’s oil and gas production rose 30% year on year and 12% from the March quarter to 89.2 petajoules in the June quarter, largely driven by increased production at the Australia Pacific LNG terminal and at the Otway Gas Plant, the company said July 31.
Sydney-based RBC Capital Markets analyst Ben Wilson said the result was broadly consistent with their expectation of 89 PJe.
“The slight production miss was due to lower than expected fuel and flare from APLNG (non-revenue generating) and lower than expected APLNG domestic gas sales,” he said in a report.
Origin’s share of LNG production from APLNG surged 22% from the March quarter to 824,000 metric tons in the June quarter as the facility underwent a 90-day operational test, during which it operated flat-out, exceeding nameplate capacity by more than 10%, the company said.
Origin announced the completion of the test July 28.
“We think the completion of the T2 lenders’ test could see APLNG take a more active approach in shifting gas between the LNG facility and the domestic market,” Wilson said.
Origin’s share of APLNG upstream production sold to the domestic market fell 6% from the March quarter to 15.2 PJ in the three months ended June, and was down from 25.3 PJ during the June quarter last year, Origin said.
Both APLNG trains are also expected to have maintenance shutdowns during the current quarter, which will see one shutdown for approximately two weeks, and one running at half rates for about one week, Origin said.
Origin’s share of total gas and ethane production from its assets in the June quarter was 38 PJ, up 8% from the March quarter, but down from 40.3 PJ in the corresponding quarter last year, it said. Production from the offshore Otway Basin surged 32% quarter on quarter to 13.6 PJ, and was up from just 5.3 PJ a year earlier.
The increase at Otway was primarily due to higher well deliverability and higher plant availability. And, the plant was impacted by a planned shutdown in the previous quarter, it said.
Nathan Richardson