Jemena’s Eastern Gas Pipeline: helping solve Australia’s gas supply gap

• Jemena has completed works to make the Eastern Gas Pipeline bi-directional, meaning the pipeline is ready to transport 200TJ/d of new gas south from Port Kembla to southeastern NSW and Victoria, in addition to the existing capability to transport 350TJ/d north into New South Wales.
• Jemena is now proceeding with the next stage of its Southern Gas Strategy which following the right regulatory and market signals will see the company make their compressor station at Wilton bidirectional – providing a new pathway for gas from northern Australia to reach the southeastern demand centres.
• Jemena’s plans provide the market extra capacity to move gas from any source to where it is most needed in Victoria and New South Wales before forecast shortages materialise – making Jemena’s strategy the fastest way to deliver competitively priced to gas to market.

Jemena’s Eastern Gas Pipeline (EGP) is now ready to transport new gas into Victoria, with the company today announcing that it has completed works to make the EGP bidirectional from Port Kembla. The announcement means that the EGP is capable of moving up to 200TJ/d of new gas south towards Victoria in addition to the existing capability to transport 350TJ/d into New South Wales.

Making the announcement ahead of the Australian Domestic Gas Outlook Conference, Jemena’s Managing Director David Gillespie said the company will now progress to the next stage of its Southern Gas Strategy.

“The initial phases of our Southern Gas Strategy has connected the Port Kembla Energy Terminal, and enabled gas to flow both northwards and southwards through the EGP. With this work complete, we are now taking steps to incorporate a new compressor station at Wilton allowing the EGP to be fully bidirectional – providing a new pathway for gas to reach southern states from Australia’s northern gas fields,” Mr Gillespie said.

“By enhancing and repurposing existing infrastructure we’re able to bring additional transportation capacity to market before forecast gas shortages materialise. This approach avoids consumers paying for multi-billion-dollar infrastructure projects which face a range of risks including protracted development timelines.

“Our strategy not only introduces greater pipeline capacity, but also optionality into the market so that gas can reach southern states via a range of different solutions including onshore pipelines or via Australia’s first regasification terminal.”

Mr Gillespie said independent modelling from Rystad Energy found that regasification terminals would be able to supply price competitive new gas to NSW and Victoria, from either northern Australia or international sources, when compared to new transcontinental pipelines.

“Globally, as we face into even greater energy uncertainty, having multiple pathways for gas to reach our large domestic markets helps reinforce Australia’s energy security as well as our ability to respond to shortages or other interruption events.”

With the right investment signals from government and customers, Jemena expects that the investment in the Wilton Compressor Station, making the EGP fully bidirectional, could be ready within two years.

Following completion of works at Wilton, Jemena will consider further expansion works to increase EGP capacity depending on market conditions.

An overview of Jemena’s Southern Gas Strategy follows below.