Oil and gas industry news : French oil and gas giant Total alongside its partners ExxonMobil and Oil Search has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Papua New Guinea (PNG) government to establish the key terms of the gas agreement for the Papua LNG Project.

Signed during the Asia Pacific Economic Conference (APEC) held at Port Moresby, the MoU paves way for the gas agreement to be finalized by the first quarter of 2019. Following the MoU, the partners have agreed to kick-start the first phase of the engineering studies of LNG project in Papua New Guinea.

Papua LNG Project

The objective of the Papua LNG Project is to bring to market the gas drawn from the Elk and Antelope onshore fields in the PRL-15 block located in Gulf Province.

Total is the operator of the PRL-15 block with a stake of 31.1%. ExxonMobil, through its acquisition of InterOil in February 2017, holds a stake of 28.3%, while Oil Search and the PNG government, hold stakes of 17.7% and 22.5%, respectively.

According to Total, the Papua LNG Project will feature a couple of LNG trains, each having a processing capacity of 2.7 MTPA. The project will be developed in synergy with the existing PNG LNG project facilities in cooperation with the facilities of the PNG LNG project, operated by ExxonMobil in partnership with Oil Search, Santos, Kumul Petroleum, JX Nippon and Mineral Resources Development.

Commenting on the new LNG project in Papua New Guinea, Patrick Pouyanne – Chairman and CEO of Total, said: “The MoU signed by the State of PNG and the partners of the Papua LNG project is an important step in all the parties’ commitment to the project.

“Investing in LNG is a long term enterprise and our objective is to be able to make the project as competitive as possible. Total being the second-largest world private LNG player, we are fully committed to the success of the Papua LNG project, which benefits from a favorable geographical location close to Asian markets.”

The central processing facility of the LNG project in Papua New Guinea will be located near the Purari River in the Gulf Province, some 360km north-west of Port Moresby. The gas processing plant will be linked to the LNG facility by onshore and offshore gas and condensate pipelines.

Caution Bay, which is located near Port Moresby, will be the location for what will be the second liquefied natural gas plant in Papua New Guinea.

  ExxonMobil, Oil and gas industry news, Oil and gas news, Oil Search, Papua LNG Project, Papua New Guinea, Patrick Pouyanne, Total