Angola's LNG helps warm the world
Dec. 10—The West African coastal country of Angola was the setting in 2014-15 of a landmark methane emissions reduction project that originated in the Permian Basin.
Permian Basin International Oil Show President Larry Richards was president-CEO of HY-BON Engineering when the Midland company was awarded the Angola project by the Chevron Corp. and Richards presented the results with Chevron Project Manager Frank Christiano at the Global Gas Flaring Reduction Partnership and Global Methane Initiative in Amsterdam.
"This gas had historically been flared at each offshore oil platform because of the lack of a natural gas pipeline," Richards said Monday. "The technical challenges were in compressing the associated gas that included a lot of heavier gases in addition to methane like propane and butane.
"When you compress those heavier gases, they tend to hit their dew point and change back to a liquid. Compressors really don't like compressing liquids. It's like pouring water into the intake of your air compressor at home. The offshore gas was very low pressure and there was a high probability of liquids dropping out of it throughout the process."
HY-BON built all the equipment and shipped the units to Houston "where teams from Angola enjoyed our culture and West Texas barbecue as they trained on the equipment prior to shipment," Richards said. "The project was a resounding success, capturing over 25 million cubic feet of previously flared gas per day and paying for itself with just the hydrocarbon liquids recovered in the process. Most importantly, it showed all players involved that it was possible and commercially viable to capture this challenging gas stream.
"At the time no Angolan liquefied natural gas plant existed, so the gas was compressed into a large underground natural storage cavern until it could be utilized by the LNG facility on the drawing board."
Richards said the reductions in gas venting and flaring had the effect of removing 812,000 cars from the road or planting 1.1 million acres of trees.
With nine billion barrels of proven oil reserves and 11 trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves, Angola is the second largest oil producer in Africa, trailing only Nigeria, and its 1.2 million barrels per day of oil production making it one of the continent's best producers.
With Luanda as its capital, Angola will use its capability of processing 1.1 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day for LNG to help warm Germany, France and the United Kingdom this winter. The country's population is 34 million.
The U.S. State Department says Angola is doing better than most other West African nations, but it has not fully recovered from its years of war. "Although the country is sub-Saharan Africa's largest oil producer and has great agricultural potential, two-thirds of the population lives in poverty," a State Department spokesman said in October.
"The United States has worked with Angola to remove thousands of landmines, promote environmental conservation and help war refugees and internally displaced people return to their homes. Angola is eligible for preferential trade benefits under the African Growth and Opportunity Act and the U.S and Angola have signed a trade and investment framework agreement that seeks to promote greater trade and investment between the two countries."
Richards said Angola's LNG project has grown to include seven LNG supertankers and three loading jetties.
"This unique project is a perfect example of leading edge technology being used to improve the environment and supply clean-burning natural gas to markets that desperately need it," he said. "One of the reasons we're so excited about the 2023 PBIOS is that it will display and highlight technologies and innovations that are driving the environmental stewardship and efficiency gains of the oil industry across the globe.
"It's amazing how many of the top onshore innovations over the past decade were born on wellsites and in offices within 100 miles of the Ector County Coliseum."
