December 14, 2023 [LNG Prime]- Shell’s LNG Canada project is now preparing to launch start-up activities next year and this program will take more than a year to complete, according to LNG Canada’s CEO, Jason Klein.

Contractor JGC Fluor is constructing the first phase of the giant LNG Canada project that includes two liquefaction trains with a capacity of 14 mtpa in Kitimat, British Columbia.

The construction of the plant, first such terminal in Canada, was about 85 percent complete in July and during the same month LNG Canada and its contractors completed LNG tank hydro testing at the project site.

TC Energy’s Coastal GasLink pipeline, which will supply natural gas to the LNG Canada terminal, was recently mechanically completed.

Shell and its partners in the project are also evaluating the second phase of the project.

Other partners include Malaysia’s Petronas, PetroChina, Japan’s Mitsubishi Corporation, and South Korea’s Kogas.

More than 85 percent complete

Klein said in LNG Canada’s 2023 year-end update the the project reached its peak construction cycle this past fall, with more than 8,000 Canadians employed at the liquefaction and export facility in Kitimat, in the traditional territory of the Haisla Nation.

He said that LNG Canada has installed all 215 of the large modules required for its gas liquefaction process and completed other critical work scopes.

“Our Kitimat facility is now more than 85 percent complete over-all,” Klein said.

“We’re now preparing for safe start-up activities to begin in 2024. That’s when our equipment is tested and fine-tuned, and we begin the process of producing LNG,” the CEO said.

Klein said that LNG Canada’s “safe start-up program will take more than a year to complete.”

“This work must be undertaken before we can start shipping our LNG abroad. We remain well-positioned to deliver our first cargoes of lower-carbon, made-in-B.C. LNG by the middle of this decade,” he said.

To date, LNG Canada and its contractors and subcontractors have awarded more than C$4.2 billion in contracts and procurement to business in British Columbia.

Of that amount, more than C$3.3 billion has been awarded to First Nations-owned businesses and local area businesses, Klein said.

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