21 Oct 2008

PNG company begins bidding process for country's first liquified natual gas plant

12:01 pm on 21 October 2008

Papua New Guinea's Esso Highlands Limited, a subsidiary of ExxonMobil Corporation has announced the start of a competitive bidding process for the construction of the country's first liquified natural gas plant.

The Post Courier newspaper reports that the two companies bidding for the contract are Bechtel of Houston, Texas in the United States and Chiyoda of Yokohama, Japan.

The bidding process is part of the front end engineering and design process, which began in May this year.

The two companies will present their designs, costs and proposals to ExxonMobil at the end of the process and one of them will be awarded the EPC contract to build the plant, which is scheduled to start in the latter part of next year.

The plant will be constructed 20 kilometres north-west of Port Moresby.