The Western Australian gas crisis looks set to continue for six to eight weeks, but there should be a marked improvement from mid-August onwards.
In an update yesterday Apache Corp, which operates the Varanus Island complex, offshore from the Northwest coast of Western Australia, said it now expected to be supplying at 57% of its pre-accident level by mid-August.
And Apache indicated that full production of 350 terajoules of gas a day from the plant will be restored by December.
The company said the level by mid-August would be around 200 terajoules a day (by around August 15).
The crisis has seen mining and industrial companies cut production, reschedule staff holidays, switch fuels (some to diesel), to try and keep production going.
Newcrest, Alcoa and NZ dairy giant, Fonterra Cooperative are among those companies switching to diesel from gas after the explosion. Brickworks, abattoirs, swimming pools, shopping centres and a host of other businesses have suffered as the gas supplies have been trimmed and electricity supplies reduced.
Minara Resources has trimmed production of nickel, BHP has advanced a major rebuild at a nickel refinery and switched the gas that was being used to an alumina refinery, and timber mills, wine companies and retailers have also changed business processes to accommodate lower gas supplies, or the vagaries of supplies that might be cut at any time.
Apache says the Varanus Island production will restart firstly through the East Spar Joint Venture processing facilities, located furthest from the ruptured pipe. These facilities were the least damaged in the fire on the island and are the easiest to bring back into production.
The Harriet Joint Venture facilities adjacent to the site of the rupture require the most repairs.
According to Perth media reports, Apache and the WA Government have sent about 140 investigators to the Varanus Island facilities to find out what caused the pipeline explosion.
The news from Apache yesterday represents better news than the West Australian Government was able to deliver a week ago when it said that it may take three months to restore half the lost capacity.
It looks like being half of that and in the meantime the Government has started bringing two coal fired power stations back on line. One at Collie will take up to 50 days to reach full capacity of 220 Megawatts because it is coming back from a major bout of maintenance.
The other at Kwinana will take a week or so after it starts up at the end of this week. As it starts up, extra electricity will gradually become available, freeing up more gas for business.
