Shell’s Prelude FLNG unit firing up after four months downtime

Energy major Shell has restarted its Prelude floating LNG production unit off northwest Australia after taking the unit offline in August.

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Reuters reported that the 3.6-million-tonnes-per-annum unit has already resumed operations and said the first cargo could be loaded shortly.

It named the Shell-chartered, 174,000-cbm Orion Bohemia (built 2022) as one of the vessels close to the world’s largest LNG floater.

Prelude — which started exporting in June 2019 — has undergone numerous blackouts and shutdowns since its start-up in 2019.

The unit was offline for 11 months in 2020 after an electrical trip led to a series of extensive investigations and repairs. A five-month shutdown period from December 2021 through until April 2022 followed due to an onboard fire.

In mid-2022, strike action by workers on the giant floater forced Shell to temporarily halt production at Prelude.

In June 2023, Shell integrated gas and upstream director Zoe Yujnovich said she was making it her “top priority” to address the supply and operational issues at Prelude.

“We have a multi-year plan to improve Prelude’s operational performance, including a planned turnaround later in the year, which will help reduce the vulnerabilities,” she said.

The director described Prelude’s operational record as “challenging, blaming its complex design and remote location”.

At the time, Yujnovich said she was making a push to improve the performance of existing assets as these are the lowest cost volumes available to the major as it moves to increase its LNG supply portfolio by one-third by 2030.