Govt rules out force majeure option for Arun
Thursday, September 4 2003 - 02:48 AM WIB
A source who wanted to remain anonymous told Petromindo.Com that the Arun plant was now running at 80 percent of its capacity.
?Production at the LNG plant is returning to normal level. Thus, force majeure is no longer an option,? he said.
On August 27, PT Arun NGL, the operator of the LNG plant, was forced to halt the plant?s production activities due to a string of accidents.
First, that day, American energy giant ExxonMobil Corp., which operates gas fields near the LNG plant and is the sole gas supplier to the plant, halted gas processing activities at its Cluster III and IV facilities, due to a fire incident at Cluster IV. The fire was quickly extinguished but caused some damages on the facility.
On the same day, power generation system Arun NGL went down, causing the plant unable to process any gas supplied from ExxonMobil.
Following the incidents, state owned oil and gas company Pertamina, which handles the sale of Arun?s LNG to South Korea and Japan, warned that it might declare force majeure on its obligation to customers.
However, the repair works by Arun NGL and ExxonMobil soon after the incident have brought fruits.
The source said ExxonMobil now could supply 1.2 billion cubic feet of gas to Arun NGL or 80 percent of the LNG plant?s normal processing capacity. (Alex)