Gippsland basin venture sanctions West Barracouta tieback

Dec. 13, 2018
ExxonMobil has decided to develop the West Barracouta gas field in the Bass Strait off southeast Australia in order to bring new supplies to the Australian domestic market.

Offshore staff

SPRING, TexasExxonMobil has decided to develop the West Barracouta gas field in the Bass Strait off southeast Australia in order to bring new supplies to the Australian domestic market.

The project is in the Gippsland basin in the VIC/L1 block offshore Victoria.

Following the completion of front-end engineering design, the Esso-BHP Gippsland basin joint venture (which supplies around 40% of east coast Australian gas demand) awarded construction contracts to Subsea 7 and OneSubsea, for a tieback to existing infrastructure at Barracouta, the first offshore field discovered in Australia.

“We continue to use advanced technology, along with our extensive, decades-long understanding of theGippsland basin, to ensure full potential of the resource can be realized,” said Neil W. Duffin, president of ExxonMobil Production Co. “Our objective is to produce West Barracouta gas for the Australian domestic gas market by 2021.”

The joint venture has invested more than $4 billion recently on other projects in Victoria, including theKipper Tuna Turrum offshore development and the Longford gas conditioning plant.

12/13/2018