PERTH (miningweekly.com) – The North West Shelf (NWS) project partners have agreed to the $2-billion development of the Greater Western Flank Phase 2 (GWF-2) project, operator Woodside reported on Friday.

The GWF-2 project would produce 1.6-trillion cubic feet of raw gas from the Keast, Dockrell, Sculptor, Rankin, Lady Nora and Pemberton fields using subsea infrastructure. The gas would be transported by a 35 km pipeline to the existing Goodwyn A platform.

The project was expected to start up in the second half of 2019 and gas delivery would initially start from five wells in the Lady Nora, Pemberton, Sculptor and Rankin fields, followed by the remaining three wells in the Keast and Dockrell fields in the first half of 2020.

Woodside CEO Peter Coleman said on Friday that the GWF-2 project was economically robust and would deliver significant value by leveraging Woodside’s substantial experience in delivering major subsea tieback projects.

“The GWF-2 project continues a series of NWS project subsea tiebacks that are commercialising its gas reserves in a timely and efficient manner to extend plateau production.”

The GWF-2 was the fourth major gas development for the NWS project in the past seven years.

Federal Resources and Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg said that, since it started production in 1984, the NWS project had provided more than 40% of Australia’s total oil and gas production and had delivered more than 4 000 shipments of LNG to the Asia-Pacific region since its first cargo in 1989.

“The continued investment in this important project highlights Australia’s ability to develop our gas resources as we remain on track to become the world’s largest LNG exporter by 2019/20.

“At a challenging time, this announcement is another sign of the strength and resilience of Australia’s resources and energy sectors, which have seen 15 projects worth around A$13-billion approved for investment since November 2014,” he added.

The NWS project, off the coast of Western Australia, is jointly owned by Woodside, BHP Billiton, BP Developments Australia, Chevron Australia, Japan Australia LNG and Shell Australia.