Wednesday, July 4

Gas wells seen as potential threat

THE Bowen Basin will be dotted with up to 7000 coal seam gas wells as academics claim the industry still does not know enough about coal seam gas and its impacts.
The huge number of wells are part of Arrow Energy's Bowen gas project which will feed its planned LNG development on Curtis Island and it this week received the State Government draft terms of reference for the environmental impact statement on the scheme.

Arrow Energy chief executive Andrew Faulkner said the Bowen gas project would involve a staged development of up to 7000 gas wells over the next 40 years, each with a lifespan of five to 20 years.

"The Bowen gas project will help meet the growing demand for gas overseas," Mr Faulkner said. "It will complement our Moranbah gas project which continues to supply both the Moranbah and Townsville power stations and mineral refining facilities in north Queensland.

"This expansion would be in an area from 30km north of Glenden to 10km south of Blackwater, and include pipelines, gas processing, power generation, water treatment and storage.

"The Arrow LNG project will extract and transport coal seam gas from Queensland's Bowen and Surat basins to be liquefied at our LNG plant at Curtis Island, off Gladstone."

He said 7000 was the upper limit of wells and it could be less.

"It's expected field development and associated infrastructure work would start in 2015 and be commissioned in 2017."

But University of Queensland gas expert Professor Sue Golding said the issue of the waste salt from CSG production was the most difficult one to resolve for the industry.


Courier Mail

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