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Santos announced this in its fourth-quarter report on Thursday.
The project was 83.5 percent complete as of October 31, 2024.
In 2021, Santos took a final investment decision for its $3.6 billion Barossa project.
Natural gas will be extracted from the Barossa field, located in Commonwealth waters about 285 kilometers offshore north-north west from Darwin, and transported via a pipeline to the existing Darwin LNG facility.
In 2023, the last LNG cargo produced from the Bayu-Undan gas field sailed from the Santos-operated Darwin LNG plant in Australia’s Northern Territory.
The final LNG shipment from Bayu-Undan left the 3.7 mtpa Darwin LNG plant at Wickham Point on November 11, 2023.
The Darwin LNG plant launched operations in 2006 and the facility is now being readied for the next 20 years, in preparation for the start of Barossa gas production in 2025.
To prepare for Barossa gas, Santos is working on the Darwin LNG life extension project.
Barossa update
Santos said in the quarterly report that the Barossa gas project remains on track for first production in the third quarter of 2025 within current cost guidance.
According to the firm, final drilling activities were completed on the second and third wells of the six-well drill program, with “strong flow test results and reservoir performance as expected.”
Moreover, Santos said the fourth well was partially drilled and suspended for return in 2025 and the fifth well in the program was spudded.
Santos said the Darwin pipeline duplication is 71.4 percent complete with the beach pull to Darwin LNG completed successfully and over 30km of pipeline installed.
The floating production, storage and offtake vessel (FPSO) integration and pre-commissioning activities “continued to plan” in Singapore, it said.
PNG LNG cargoes
During the fourth quarter, the ExxonMobil-operated PNG LNG project in Papua New Guinea shipped 29 cargoes of LNG, down by 1 LNG cargo compared to the same quarter in 2023 and up by four cargoes compared to the previous quarter, according to Santos.
PNG LNG produced about 2.10 million tonnes in the fourth quarter. This compares to 2.11 million tonnes in the fourth quarter of 2023 and 1.93 million tonnes in the prior quarter.
Santos now has a 39.9 percent stake in the LNG export plant in Caution Bay after it sold its 2.6 percent stake in the LNG project to Papua New Guinea’s national oil and gas company Kumul Petroleum.
ExxonMobil holds a 33.2 percent operating interest in PNG LNG which is able to produce more than 8.3 million tonnes of LNG annually, an increase of 20 percent from the original design specification of 6.9 mtpa.
GLNG
As per the Santos-operated Gladstone LNG export plant on Curtis Island near Gladstone, the facility shipped 30 LNG cargoes during the fourth quarter, up by one cargo compared to the same quarter in 2023 and a rise by nine cargoes compared to the prior quarter.
The 7.8 mtpa facility produced 1.79 million tonnes of LNG during the quarter, up from 1.71 million tonnes in the same quarter in 2023 and from 1.30 million tonnes in the prior quarter, according to Santos.
Santos said LNG production increased compared to the previous quarter as seasonal shaping of GLNG’s domestic gas commitment over the winter months (impacting second quarter and third quarter) had been fulfilled for 2024.
The company said full-year LNG sales are “in line” with guidance of around 6 mtpa.
Sales revenue down
The independent LNG producer said that its October-December sales revenue reached $1.40 billion.
This marks a drop compared to $1.48 billion in the same quarter in 2023 but it rose compared to $1.26 billion in the prior quarter.
Santos said fourth-quarter sales revenues were higher than the prior quarter, primarily due to higher crude oil, condensate and LNG volumes, offset by lower average realized prices across the portfolio.
The company’s production of 21.5 mmboe was lower 1 percent compared to the previous quarter.
The Australian LNG player said its average realized LNG price of $12.39 per MMBtu in the fourth quarter was lower compared to 12.69 per MMBtu in the prior quarter but it was higher from 12.33 per MMBtu in the same quarter in 2023.
Average realized LNG prices were lower than the prior quarter, with lower realized prices from oil-linked sales contracts reflecting lagged Japan Customs-cleared Crude, partially offset by higher realized prices from JKM-linked sales contracts.
Santos said three-month lagged JCC averaged $85.99/bbl in the fourth quarter of 2024 compared to $87.58/bbl in the third quarter.