APA Group has completed feasibility work on the optimal path to market for gas produced from Elixir Energy’s north-western Taroom Trough gas and condensate production pilot project.

Elixir has now appointed Simpliphi to complete the first phase of concept select and engineering works on the necessary upstream plant for the project, now dubbed the Warkon Pilot.

It also intends to explore collaborative opportunities with Taroom Trough neighbours on multi-user and shared infrastructure and to raise them with the Queensland Government’s Taroom Trough Development Forum.

“Through targeted studies and preliminary engineering, we are building a clearer picture of the capital requirements, infrastructure options and development timelines required to bring Taroom Trough oil and gas to market,” Elixir Energy managing director and chief executive officer Stuart Nicholls said.

“As our appraisal inventory grows and sufficient scale is established, the Warkon work provides a practical framework for progressing towards pilot production and, ultimately, converting our substantial resource position into productive, revenue-generating assets.”

APA’s feasibility work showed the best economics with a direct pipeline to the north-east to the Wallumbilla Gas Hub, which links gas supply from the Surat and Bowen basins to domestic markets and LNG export facilities.

The work has provided two viable pipeline routes with similar lengths (52 and 53km) to reach the WGH, which provides optionality to optimise land access and environmental approvals in the detailed design phases.

As the gas comes to surface some minor upstream conditioning is required to meet the pipeline specifications before arriving at the WGH.

This includes condensate dropout (and trucking offload for sale), dehydration and temperature management.

Simpliphi is set to work on the design and capacity of this upstream plant to match the potential APA infrastructure.

The feasibility study covered a capacity of 40 TJ/d which would be capable of being run between 5 and 150 TJ/d.

Elixir said the initial Class 5 estimate indicated that a 15-year length tariff on this infrastructure would incur capacity charges between $0.35 GJ and $1.32 GJ depending upon throughput of the pilot production between 150 and 40 TJ/d respectively.

‘These figures demonstrate just how advantaged Elixir’s Taroom Trough assets are with regards to their proximal nature to this critical sales point and minimal capital required to connect into the east coast domestic and LNG gas markets,’ the company said.

Elixir is aiming to appraise its ~3.5 TCF of independently certified 2C contingent gas resources on tenure which borders Shell’s primary area of investment within the Taroom Trough.