Following a 7.5 magnitude earthquake in Papua New Guinea on 26th February 2018,the upstream gas conditioning facility,Hides Gas Conditioning Plant (HGCP),was shut down resulting in the shutdown of the Liquefied Natural Gas Plant (LNGP).The LNG in the storage tanks was used as fuel gas to power essential systems at LNGP and a portion of Port Moresby.Due to the unknown duration of the recovery,process facilities were adapted to prolong the use of this fuel gas supply to eliminate power disruptions and prevent a complex and lengthy restart for LNGP.Three major facility adaptations were implemented:i.Adjusted boil-off gas (BOG) compressor operation to meet fuel gas needs ii.Modified storage and loading facilities to receive LNG from a ship iii.Utilized ship's onboard vaporizer to send gas to the plant inlet Prior to the implementation of the facility adaptations,technical assessments were performed to ensure the feasibility of each change.Standard process simulation software was used to model the dynamic behavior of LNG (i.e.composition,temperature,density,BOG rate,weathering,stratification,rollover time).Standard process simulation software,applied with an innovative technique,provided an accurate and efficient method of predicting dynamic LNG behavior,eliminating the need for time-consuming Computational Fluid Dynamic modeling or specific software.Through the cross-functional efforts of operations,maintenance,marine and technical teams,LNGP was able to adapt the current facilities to ensure power availability and reduce restart time after a major earthquake affected production from the upstream facilities.
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