Pertamina says work at Arun 70% complete

Pertamina says work at Arun 70% complete

JAKARTA (JP): Preparations for the start-up of the Arun gas
fields in Aceh are running smoothly with about 70 percent of the
work completed, a official at the state oil and gas company
Pertamina said on Friday.

Spokesman for Pertamina's managing production sharing
directorate Sidick Nitikusuma said that at this working pace,
preparations could be finalized within a week.

"Progress is being made faster than we thought possible," he
told The Jakarta Post.

Sidick declined to set a date for Arun to start pumping gas to
the nearby Arun liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant.

"I don't want to be specific, something can always happen and
disrupt our schedule," he said.

The Arun gas field was slated for production by early July,
but a bomb explosion at one of its gas pipelines about two weeks
ago slowed down the preparations.

The blast occurred some 34 kilometers from the fields,
alongside the pipeline that transports gas from the fields to PT
Arun's liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant.

Following the incident, Arun's field operator, the U.S.-based
ExxonMobil Oil Indonesia Inc., suspended work in remote areas
where the pipelines run. The work has not resumed since.

ExxonMobil has deployed some 200 workers at Arun to lay the
groundwork for the gas field's start-up.

According to Sidick, the explosion has set back the work by
one week. Nonetheless, he added, ExxonMobil was able to make up
for the lost time by simply working harder.

Also, thanks to the fairly good condition of Arun's long
abandoned gas facilities, ExxonMobil's repair work is progressing
well, he said.

"The reading instruments were damaged ... but it is more
difficult to repair the pipelines," he said.

Sidick said two of Arun's four pipelines were damaged in April
when technical problems caused gas to flare up at a gas
collection facility at Cluster IV.

As repairing the two pipelines will time, ExxonMobil will
resume the gas flow from two other smaller pipelines, he said.

"We've planned it that way, so we will start production with
two (gas fields) clusters only," he explained.

Sidick said from the time gas began to flow into the Arun's
LNG plant, it would require one week to produce the first drop of
LNG.

The plant, he continued, was constantly running even though no
gas was flowing into it. He said it would allow Pertamina to
immediately start production once the plant was fed with gas
without having to warm up the machines.

"It will take 12 hours to fill the tankers," he added.

Separately, ExxonMobil spokeswoman Julia Tumengkol confirmed
that work at Arun was running smoothly, saying "progress is going
well."

But she too refused to set a target for the resumption of
Arun's operation. "We're doing the best we can to resume
operation within this month," she said.

ExxonMobil, Julia went on, was still assessing the damage from
its abandoning of the gas facilities.

Julia also said the company had yet to resume work in the
remote areas between the gas fields and the Arun LNG plant where
the pipelines ran.

ExxonMobil pulled out of Arun in mid-March following a series
attacks on its staff

The attacks allegedly was committed by members of the Free
Aceh Movement (GAM), which have been fighting for an independent
state for over 20 years.

ExxonMobil's withdrawal from Arun prompted the suspension of
Arun LNG plant's production, cutting off LNG exports to Japan and
South Korea.

Indonesia earned about US$100 million a month from Arun's LNG
exports.

ExxonMobil returned to Arun in late June after it concluded
that security conditions had improved. Its compound remains
heavily guarded by the military.(bkm)